Traveling Bushcrafter's Hidden Campsite
I assume most of us
have seen those television survival shows where one or two people amble off
into some sort of “survival situation” replete with film crew, medical staff,
local guides, cell phones, GPS equipment, and in some cases local caterer. Millions of bored folks eagerly sit in front
of the tube watching these shows and then get on their favorite “bushcraft
forums” and discuss who did what and how they supposedly did it. But out here in the wilds we’ve got our own
shows to watch and we watch them on a weekly basis. Now these bushcrafters move through sans film
crew or back-up squad and if they have to walk barefoot it’s not because they
want to or because they subscribe to something lame like, “This is who I am.” These traveling experts don’t say things
like, “I’ve been a bushcrafter for twenty years.” They don’t even know what bushcraft means and
they probably don’t care. They try their
best to move through unseen, like ghosts or shadows keeping to the trees and as
far as they can from habitations. Mind
you, the majority of people wandering through these parts are decidedly not
bushcrafters of any sort. They come from
big cities to the south and from Europe and Asia or even Africa. I’ve met many of them. A few years ago a group drifted through from
Bosnia. They were scared, lost, hungry
and panicked. That’s a frequent scenario
and if you’ve kept up with this blog you know that bodies are frequently found
east and west of here—the remains of people who trekked through with no idea of
what they were getting into.
But now and then some
real bushcraft types move through and though we seldom see them we do find
evidence of their presence in the area.
A wickiup hidden in a thicket, a small campfire dug into a hole, a snare
trap made from hastily spun agave fibers, a tiny drying rack made to jerk
javelina or hog meat. A neighbor told me
of finding a clandestine campsite a couple of weeks ago and a few years back I
found where somebody had taken up residence in a deer blind (a small tower people
climb into to shoot deer), and last summer I found the remains of an impromptu shelter
somebody had fashioned using some discarded sheet metal. These people come from the jungles or deserts
to the south. They have lived their
lives without electricity or motored vehicles.
I’ve encountered dozens who, though from Mexico or Central America, speak
little Spanish. About ten years ago I
ran into a man who had made camp in an extremely thick area. He had a machete either pilfered from
somebody’s barn or hunting cabin or perhaps he’d traveled with the long blade
from his homeland. His Spanish was so
mixed with Indian words that we communicated poorly. He was from Central America and in the last
few years we’ve seen the majority of people coming through are either from El
Salvador or Guatemala. When I asked him
about his sojourn he simply shrugged and smiled and I got the impression his
concept of going somewhere was different from mine. He was camped and that was all there was to
it. He smiled a lot but I didn’t smile
back and kept beyond reach of his machete.
He must have decided that if one fellow could find him then others might
too because when I went looking for him the next day he was gone. From the remains of his campsite he’d been
parked in those woods for about a week.
He was using a couple of discarded beer bottles as water
containers. When I cut his sign to get
an idea of how he was living I found he was sneaking to a windmill about a half-mile
distant at night to fill up. I found
where he’d been making tea from colima leaves, Zanthoxylum fagara. Colima
has been used as a sedative. There was a
small pile of pecan shells so somewhere along the line he’d picked some
pecans. I put the man in his mid to late
thirties and he was puro Indio from
the jungles.
A
lot of people seem to think that bushcraft is basically about knowing how to
make feather sticks and bow drills. They
talk about “practicing their skills” and on weekends venture into the woods and
make fire with sticks and whittle out wooden spoons. That is most certainly a part of bushcraft
though only a small part. The biggest
part is knowing plants both edible and medicinal. Some people claim that knowing plants is of
little use because you’ve got to eat meat.
But that’s not true. Dietary
diversity is essential because you need a well-rounded diet with both protein,
carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals and fiber.
These traveling bushcrafters know their plants.
A
fellow who lives in the area who goes by the name, Tres Manos, (Three Hands because he can do the work of more than
one man) came from an Indian village in central Mexico. When he was eleven years old he and his two
older brothers walked across the desert all the way to the Nueces River about
125 miles north of here. They lived
mostly on plants but were able to trap a few nopal rats here and there. His stamina, even today at 36 years old, is
phenomenal.
Last
night temperatures dipped here into the mid-30s. Not too cold when compared to other areas to
the north but I imagine some of these traveling bushcrafters were probably in
the area. Huddled in a granjeno mott
perhaps drinking tea brewed from salvia
(Croton sp.) or from colima. It was cold enough to keep the rattlesnakes
away and the scorpions and centipedes too.
They probably slept on the cold ground and may not have even made a fire
so the Border Patrol wouldn’t smell any camp smoke or spot a fire from a helicopter.
The majority move through and never get
caught. Traveling bushcrafters.
