Look, I wanna run off inna woods and live in a cabin far away from the world as much as the next guy…but I’m not doing it in a tent, in the winter, in Colorado. Oh, sure, some people can do it, but those people did a bit more homework than watching a few YouTube videos.
When I go Galt and shut the door on humanity, it’ll be in a very well stocked, well fortified, well heated, well constructed little cabin. Believe me, living in a tent is no way to go when you don’t have to. Sure, plenty of hunting camps have wall tents in the winter. But shouldn’t we want better than a canvas house?
I’ll be interested in learning more about this as time goes by. If you see any articles with more info, please link in the comments.
So, hiking off into the woods, not planning on returning, without going camping and trying it out for a few years, going at different times of the year learning to secure food and shelter,, that is a bad idea??
How about getting in a deep sea submersible?? I hear that’s fun.
This was sheer idiocy.
Darwinism in action, and they’re eligible for a Darwin Award, for taking out their kids too.
Looks like the parents confused “off-grid” with “out of our minds”.
Unfortunately you’re right on.
This reminds me of “Into the Wild” which unfortunately has become a cult classic and is no longer the stark warning it should be…
I’ve seen other articles, but there’s been some hasty editing done. Last night, the yahoo article noted that the three were emaciated, that there was a lean-to with a fire pit next to the tent, and that they’d been using a tree only a few steps away as a waste area. That information was gone this morning.
They must have had a vehicle available at some time, but there wasn’t a vehicle left at the camp parking lot. Given away, traded, stolen? I’d bet there’s more to the story.
https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2023-07-26/they-moved-to-the-colorado-rockies-to-live-off-the-grid-away-from-a-perilous-world-the-adventure-ended-badly
I too saw where there was a lean-to in other stories. After searching several articles this is the only one I found with the lean-to mentioned.
In my time in the Military I spent a lot of time in the field both in warmer months and winter months. The sheer amount of supplies needed to survive in a tent in winter for a long term, say, 4 weeks, is daunting. To do it as an off grid lifestyle is at best folly at worst suicide. I’ll take the well designed cabin with accessories and growlies!!! Canada at -40 C is so much fun!
Try Wisconsin at -10 with no shelter (sleeping bags only) and no fire for 4 days,welcome to the Marine Corps.
I’ve known a man who lived in a tent through a Fairbanks winter. They burned a LOT of wood, and made regular trips to the grocery store. He said it wasn’t too bad, but they didn’t try to do it again.
Richard Proenneke: books (One Man’s Wilderness) is an inspiration on how a person determined to live ‘Beyond the Sidewalk’ can succeed. But he had a lot of experience living on a homestead prior to moving off grid. OTJ – not gained from watching video’s or ‘Grizzly Adams’..
Most of the books I’ve seen deal with moving to the rurals while society is still functioning. Where you still have electricity to light your home, refrigerate your food and pump your water from a deep well.
I’ve been watching the “Alone” series with my kids. Season 9, the contestants are having success with snares, bow and arrow, fishing, and foraging, but they are still all starving to death slowly. There isn’t enough squirrel and grouse to keep the weight on.
Over time, the contestants have learned to ‘game’ the show, putting on 50 pounds beforehand, etc. In this second to current season, the ones left at 50 days have all lost around a pound a day, are moving slowly, making poor decisions, clumsy, and mentally altered.
I recommend the show as a whole bunch of ‘wake up and smell the reality’ of trying to live in the bush ‘off the land’. EVERY season has them slowly starving to death despite their successes with building shelter and finding/catching food.
Some of the ones who have ‘tapped out’ early were doing very well and had a bad setback, a fall, or a cut, or gastric distress. It doesn’t take much to go from ‘barely making it but willing to keep trying’ to ‘come get me, I got wet and it’s below freezing and I really don’t want to die.’
It’s available on streaming services, and I’m sure other places as well.
nick
FWIW- the big mouths don’t last, and some of the poorest performers were survival/bushcraft/trad crafts trainers in real life…
I think the Season 9 winner Juan Pablo Quinones has some real life experience living the the boreal forest of The North. He wrote an excellent book on living long term in that area. The name of the book is THRIVE – here is an Barnes & Noble link to it.
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/thrive-juan-pablo-qui-onez/1141821309
I knew I’d never last off the grid in winter because I read. Two favorites are We Like It Wild by Bradford Angier (he also wrote other survival books) and We Took to the Woods by Louise Dickinson Rich.
Wow, those are some Hardcore Darwin-Card Winners there… and Deserved them! The ‘backstory’ on this is probably quite Interesting; the How/What/Why chain of thought(?) that led them to do this is probably rather Strange, to say the least.
Nature is BRUTAL, no doubt about it. People tend to have romanticized views of nature, but in the end it is brute force that wins.