Backpacking without breaking your back – 3

Fire or at least combustion.

Different ways to spark your fire into life.

                Combustion – You will need to light fire somehow. Whether it is your stove, fuel tab or campfire you will need something to start it. There are many choices that have been used for many years. I try to carry three ways to make fire with me.

1)      Almost always in my pocket is a butane lighter. I don’t smoke, but it is so much more convenient to use a lighter to light a stove several times a day.

2)      Attached to my fixed blade sheath is a ferro rod. These work when you need them to. Wet, cold it doesn’t matter you will get 5,400*F when striking one of these. Along with that I carry some sort of accelerant whether it is Mini-Inferno, Wetfire or a homemade starter. I will use natural when I can, but I want surefire when I NEED it.

3)      Flint and Steel to me is the best long term fire starting method. As long as you have a Steel, everything else can be found or made in the woods. Flint and Steel works so much easier than friction fire for me.

4)      Some might carry matches, I never really have. It is all up to what you are comfortable with.

              Yes I can start my stove with a ferro rod. In fact I had to on the last trip I took because I loaned out my lighter before leaving and never got it back. You should keep some sort of dry tinder in your fire kit for the flint and steel and even the ferro rod. Practice good fire building skills every time you build a fire. A lot of people tend to skimp on preparations when building their fire. They start out with huge piles of prep, then a few fire later the piles get smaller and smaller. Until eventually they don’t have enough preps to get the fire going and have to start over again. Muscle memory is what you are building each time you build a fire. Meaning as you build your fires over and over again, you gather material with less thinking each time. When or if you are ever in an emergency situation, and you need a fire you will have to think less about how much tinder and preps to gather to have surefire. Each and every time I go out I “practice” all of my skills. Much like a Doctor practices medicine, everything we do is practicing. We might not need a fire to keep warm when we light it with Flint and Steel, but if we ever do and that is all we have we will be glad we practiced with it. All of these fire methods will fit in a very small lightweight package even a small Altoids sized tin. I do not carry all of my fire starting ways in the same spot though. I carry a lighter in my pants pocket, a ferro rod on my knife sheath and the Flint and Steel in a small tin in my pack. If I were ever to lose one, I would still have two more ways of making fire. By the way in the Flint and Steel fire kit are usually another small ferro rod and Fresnel lens with char cloth, Jute twine and a small stick of fatwood.