I've been gonna post a thread about this topic for some time now. Just to show what has worked for me over the years and why I've come to enjoy the continueing path to fine tune the perfect home in the high country.
I Camped with my Grandfather as a kid in his old green wall tent with it's three foot side walls. It was my first wall tent after he passed on. It still held the smell of those old camp sites, the smoke of many fires came back when you set it up each time. It had no internal frame and was set up using a rope streched tight between two trees. I still have grandpa's lantern and three burner coleman stove.
A bear finished that old tent off by making a couple extra doors in it.
I started putting together a new camp by trading a lion hunt for a new white canvas tent with 5 ft sidewalls. Couldn't aford a frame so I made do with a rope and comealong between a couple tree's. I started adding the campfire smoke and memory's to that tent one hunt at a time and a added bonus of taking my wife and daughter to the hills for summer vacations.
The best memorys for me are the trips and the additions I came up with for that camp. A kitchen box built with scraps, cots repaired and added. I built a internal frame out of irrigation pipe the horses ruined. And corner brackets that will hold the pipe or lodgepoles cut and peeled in the back country.
Next came the porch I added after seeing a picture in the local newspaper of a sheepherders camp in the early 19 hundreds. No tent manufacture offered them then. (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v347/roughcountry/IMG_0489.jpg)
My porch doubles as mantie tarps and has the blood stains to bring back those memories.
I've added a second tent and built a couple stoves to go with this camp. Floor tarps were added, shower made with a wood floor grate and a weed sprayer with a shower nozzle in place of the wand.
One tent has added memories of a couple trad gang brothers in the walls now, I'll be adding more of those memories in the future hopefully.
My reason for posting this is that hopefully more folks here on trad gang will start or add to the traditional camp they have. Dosn't have to be canvas wall tents like mine, the canvas just brings the smells of hunts past flooding back for me. They also look great in pics with bows & quivers hanging in them :)
I have a couple more pictures to post of what I'm adding to my camps these days. Be back later.
Great post! I am in the process of "slowly" building what I call my "retirement kit"! Leaning toward one the hunter tents that whip carries. Looking forward to more pics.
Here's mine when I first built it; cabin is 7ft by 5ft; the deck was only 3 ft; I added to the deck which is now 8 X 8ft.
http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w129/Trooper_026/MVC-005F.jpg (http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w129/Trooper_026/cid_01f201c76609caea25b066bd0b44DCB.jpg)
Trooper, thats quite a camp. Ever get a shot from that chair?
I've put a tent in over the winter a couple times. It gives me a place to warm up, fix a meal or stay the night if needed. I use my 8 by 10 as it's easyer to heat. I noticed the metal frame will sweat in the cold weather so I made some new corner brackets and a lodgepole pine frame. I'll leave the poles there when the tent comes down. And a set in other places I plan to hunt.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v347/roughcountry/2009_0602Dollar0003.jpg)
You don't have to buy a expensive frame for these things. They are easy to make and you can drive nails in the poles to dry wet clothes and such. The brackets are made from muffler pipe.
Here's a picture of my winter camp around the 1st of december. It gets around 3 to 4 ft of snow thru the winter. It has a board floor up on logs and the tarp lets the snow slide off. When the snow piles up on each side it makes the tent warmer.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v347/roughcountry/Picture_0676.jpg)
I love these posts!!!
I agree, these are the best! Good stuff my friends, good stuff!
Great pics! nice set up Roughcountry. Trooper, nice use of climbing sticks to get into your tent.
My winter camp is mainly for hunting bobcats but I've lost a few arrows to the snowshoe rabbits.
A little tip, survey ribbon will mark the loss untill the snow melt and you can find most of the arrows :)
QuoteOriginally posted by Roughcountry:
Here's a picture of my winter camp around the 1st of december.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v347/roughcountry/Picture_0676.jpg)
Good thread Robin. But tell me, did that tree get struck by lightning? Just wondering what that orange stripe is. I found a big fir a couple weeks ago that was hit in early June, it virtually exploded!
I have some elk camp pics somewhere?
Hey Ron, hows yer summer going?
The streak on that tree is a peeled teepe pole I stood up there to dry. A old guy asked me to get him 7 replacement poles, tall & strait.
I figured if I cut them in the winter when the sap was down they might not check as much. They skid real nice in the snow behind the sled :D
I plan on putting my camp in this winter, done hunting for the state for a couple years. Gotta try to tree a bob down low enough that I can reach it with a arrow. Maybe hunt a 15 year old clearcut? ;)
Had a friend in Virgina send me a Jornal to print in (or learn to write) Can't think of a better place to print thoughts in a jornal than in a wall tent.
that muffler pipe frame is a really neat idea.
Robin... sorry to hear the Govt. job went dry. I know you loved it.
Of course now you can hunt for yourself and I know you love that as well. Looking forward to hearing a story or two about your cat hunting and seeing a hero pic of a bob and bow.
Wish I was there to help ya.
Good to see you posting Robin. I can almost feel the memories and nostalgia held within the fibers of that canvas...brings back fond memories of other camps I've spent time in.
Trooper, that's one way to keep the moccasins out from underfoot around camp.
Morning Charlie. I knew going in it was just three winters for the state. Now I'm bad hooked, can't beleive the things you see when in the woods everyday thru the winter. They might start a new unit in a couple years.
I decided to patch that old homemade stove we burned thru on our Hells Canyon hunt. Then for a few more hunts I'll think about you & Curtis everytime I add a log to the stove.