Some people like s’mores, others like hot dogs, but my favorite food to make over a campfire is peach cobbler. Mr. Soifer taught me how to make it while I was on a scout camping trip. Mr. Soifer is truly stuck in the 60’s/70’s, with his scraggily pony tail, tie dye shirt and purple tinted glasses. While making the cobbler, he didn’t know exactly how much peach filling you need, or how long it needed to cook, he just “feels it”. Somehow, the cobbler turned out just perfect. So even though I’ve never seen a recipe (it’s not complicated), I’d like to share my cobbler making knowledge.

I make cobblers is what’s called a Dutch oven. A Dutch oven is basically a heavy cast iron pot with a heavy cast iron lid. Since they are made of iron, you aren’t supposed to wash them with soap and water. Instead, you just scrape it clean with a spoon or knife, wipe it down, and lather it with oil. Mr. Soifer said this method of “cleaning” makes the flavor better for the next time.

Two dutch ovens

The first thing you have to do is butter the oven. Basically take a half of a stick of butter in your hand and spread it around the inside of the oven. Complete coverage keeps the cobbler from sticking after it’s done. Next, in separate bowl, pour in the cake mix. Stir in about a half of a cup of oil, a cup of water, and two eggs. After that, pour most of a large can of peach pie filling into the Dutch oven, followed by the cake batter. Finally, dump the rest of the can of peaches, spreading it around on the top. Two or three small cans can substitute for a large one.

To cook your cobbler, you will need a strong wood fire with a substantial amount of coals, or alternatively charcoal briquettes. Put the lid on the oven, and place it on a small bed of hot coals. For uniform cooking, place even more coals on top. This can be done with a shovel, or two sticks used like chopsticks, or any other creative method you can think of. If you are making more than one batch, Dutch ovens can even be stacked to conserve coals, as seen in the picture.

Now the waiting game begins. Depending on the temperature of the coals, cooking time can vary from an hour to an hour and 45 minutes. To check if it’s done, just treat it like any other baked good and stick a fork or tooth pick in it, and make sure it comes out clean. The most difficult part of the whole process is resisting the temptation to check if it is done every five minutes. Although I am a high strung when it comes to cooking, Mr. Soifer’s slowed down vibes taught me to just chill and “feel” when it’s done instead of incessantly checking.

The final product is a fluffy peach infused cake, with runny peach filling on the bottom. It Is best served warm, and with a spoon to make sure you get plenty of the peaches on the bottom. And of course, if you happen to have some vanilla ice cream, that makes it even better.

One may say hiking is “just walking from one place to another”. And they are absolutely right. However, given the attitude and location it can be a very rewarding activity both physically and mentally. Some perspective about hiking from Cheryl Strayed in her memoir of her trek on the Pacific Crest trail because she said it better than I ever could:

“It had to do with how it felt to be in the wild. With what it was like to walk for miles with no reason other than to witness the accumulation of trees and meadows, mountains and deserts, streams and rocks, rivers and grasses, sunrises and sunsets. The experience was powerful and fundamental. It seemed to me that it had always felt like this to be a human in the wild, and as long as the wild existed it would always feel this way.”

From experience, I know that one of the hardest things is trying to enjoy a hike when your feet hurt. Probably harder than snipe hunting. So what should you wear on your feet while hiking? Footwear is intuitively an important consideration while hiking. Some people swear by sneaker, others bolster boots. If someone said “lets go hiking, but I won’t say where we are going”, I’d wear my boots every time. Besides superior weather protection, durability and looks, boots provide ankle support that prevents twisting spraining while traversing rocks or uneven ground. The downside to boots is the fact they are heavier than sneakers, which means you’ll have to work just a little bit harder. Sneakers are best for fast pace, even trails with little risk of ankle twisting. Also, in general, good sneakers/running shoes have superior arch support for extended trips.

If anyone plans on hiking Mt. Nittany, I would actually suggest wearing boots or some kind of sturdy shoe. The rockiness of the trail really surprised me the first time I hiked it. The rocks especially could cause a hazard if you misstep because it’s dark or you aren’t paying attention.

Although it’s something not often considered in every day life, sock choice is crucial if you want to have a good time hiking. Wool socks are the preferred hiking sock for a few reasons. First, they typically provide a little more cushion and prevent blisters. From my experience, wool socks allow your feet to glide across contours of your shoes. Wool socks retain thermal properties even when wet, so you do not have to worry about getting cold feet after crossing a stream or walking in the rain. Some hard core hikers wear “liner socks”, which are very thin silky socks between their feet and their wool socks. I think they are bologna, since I have never had a problem with blisters even though I simply wear wool.

For some people however, blisters are inevitable while hiking. So here are some general first aid suggestions. First of all, if your feet feel hot in one particular area, stop and investigate because it is likely a “hot spot” aka precursor to a blister. Using cloth tape (I’ve seen duct tape used as well but don’t condone it), secure a cotton swab or pad to the area with the goal of reducing friction. Band-aids are good for small areas.  Alternatively, one can use a specialized self adhesive product called moleskin to prevent blisters. If a blister does occur on a hike, I have always been told to pop it at the base with a sterile needle,  and then protect it with cotton/tape, although this may not be kosher.

For Sail

My sailboat

One outdoor activity I have more recently grown fond of is sailing. I bought my first sail boat three years ago. It was a year 1960 something “Starcraft”, that needed a lot of repair. I fixed it up, sailed it, and sold it. I have done this one other time since, and I am currently on my third sailboat, a Hobie 16 catamaran if anyone is familiar. Along the way, you might say I have gained somewhat of a sailor’s mouth. I would like to share some of my newfound jargon with you landlubbers.

The word “rope” does not exist when you are on a sailboat. What is called a rope on land is called a line on a sailboat. Each line has a particular use, and each one has a particular name. For a few basic examples, a line called a “sheet” is used to pull sails in and out of the wind, thus adjusting its speed. A line called the “halyard” is used for raising and lowering a sail.

Many sailboats have a “boom” on the bottom of the sail. It is basically a metal or wood spire that is perpendicular to the mast that attaches to the bottom of the sail. It provides support for the sail and allows the wind to push against the sail. I’m not exactly sure where the name came from but I have a good guess. On several occasions I have lost my attention while sailing, taking in the beauty of the surroundings or just spacing out and BOOM something whacks me in the head. If the wind switches and you are not paying attention, you are liable to find out how the boom got its name.

If a sailor says he is tacking, he is not talking about his poor taste in clothing. Tacking is the basic process of turning the boat various degrees relative to the wind. Intuitively, a sail boat cannot sail directly up wind, and this is true; it’s called being “in irons”. However, tacking allows you to move up wind if you have to. Basically, you just take a zig-zag path, making a little forward progress each time.

I am sure most people know that capsizing means flipping over a boat, but can you guess what turtling means? If you can imagine a turtle swimming in a pond, with its shell above water level then you know what it is to turtle a boat. The boat flips, and the mast points directly downwards. The hull of the boat then looks something like a turtle shell sticking out of the water. Luckily, I have only turtled a boat once, and it was in deep water. Believe it or not, the biggest problem with turtling a boat is the mast can get stuck in the mud, which makes righting the boat nearly impossible.

I would like to break the trend of my blog this week and talk about why I feel knowledge of practical outdoor skills are important for everyone to know. The documentary we watched concerning violence and masculinity suggested that America was going through some kind of “Masculinity crisis”. This made me think of why I decided to write this blog. I think that my knowledge of the subject of the outdoors accumulated because of what some may call a “masculinity crisis” that is, I desire to have certain skills and knowledge that is customary for a man to have. However, this is the first time I have thought of my knowledge in this way. Ideologies, such as the American ideal of masculinity, are strongly held but unconscious, which explains why I never identified my quest for outdoor skills as a search for manliness. Although I do not condone certain aspects of American Masculine Ideology, I find myself supportive of reversing the trend of the “Wussification of America”. Although it may seem that this idea is stuck in the past (and they may be), I find that an education of certain stereotypically masculine knowledge to be beneficial to all people. Despite the fact that this seems like a plug for the content of my blog, I genuinely think society would operate more efficiently if more people took up traditionally masculine skills. Let me stop with the generalizations and suggest some specific examples.

Although it departs slightly from the nature of this blog (ha) I think vehicle maintenance is a perfect example of a “masculine” skill that should be universally held. I went on a road trip this past summer with six of my friends across the country to various western National Parks. Climbing the Black Hills to reach Mount Rushmore, our RV started to shudder and almost didn’t make the ascent. It finally broke down in northern Wyoming, but luckily we made it to a local mechanic before it stopped altogether. He identified the problem as a clogged fuel filter. I suggested that my buddies come watch as he replaced it, but they had no interest and waited inside the RV. One thousand miles down the road, the problem happened again and I was able to clean the filter thanks to my desire for the manly knowledge of auto repair. And we were on the road again (we actually played the song too).

My intent is not to be self-righteous, but instead to highlight the innocent lack of interest my friends had about interworking of a vehicle, which is something I consider to be masculine knowledge. For some clarification and explanation of the specific interests of my friends, all six of them are currently pursuing an engineering degree. One might have assumed(I did) that future engineers would have some interest concerning “how things work” and for that reason alone pursue the knowledge of what went wrong with our house on wheels. Although the assertion could be made that my friends’ interests are misguided, I think that they do exemplify of the fact that some portion of young people of the United States prefer to consume the refined knowledge of the classroom instead of the raw life skills of the world we live in. Thus, I think a shot of masculinity would do America some good to the extent that we should uphold a balance between the practical world and the pursuit of success through academia.

Confessions of a (want to be) lumberjack

When I was younger, I loved to watch my dad and others fell trees. More recently, clients and their neighbors seem to be fascinated and watch as I cut trees. I have noticed two key emotions that likely lead to this fascination. First is amazement that a human is dominating something much more massive than himself. The second is remorse for destroying an object of natural beauty that has taken so many years to grow and had potential to grow for countless years to come. However, felling trees helps to perpetuate the human race by providing it shelters, fuel, paper, or by protecting a single home from the threat of downed limbs in a storm. A portion of my job over the past few years has been removing trees that threaten to fall on homes or otherwise damage property, and so I have become familiar with the modern tool of the trade: the chainsaw. Here are some of my observations:

Take a course of course

My dad has always had a philosophy of “learn by doing”, so I was practically left on my own to learn how to use a chainsaw. I regret this not because anything went horribly wrong, but because it could have, and it is much safer and less frustrating to take a course.

Chainsaws don’t dig dirt.

After a tree is felled, one must then cut it into reasonable length pieces to burn, which is called bucking. The problem is that as you cut farther through the log, you get closer to the ground. One might think that dirt is soft compared to wood, however dirt is made of hard components such as sand (think sandpaper) and rapidly dulls the chain. To remedy this: put the log you are cutting on top of another piece of wood, or cut half way through then roll the log  over and cut the rest from the top.

Trust your cutting buddy

I wouldn’t trust Bobby to do my math homework, but I know he is always there to warn me of dangerous situation and willing to help get me out of it. Over the past two years, we built a sort of respect of each other’s abilities and a means of communication to make sure no one gets hurt. One analog is a football team, each player must be able to anticipate and rely on the others’ actions.

Bobby tying rope to guide tree as it falls

Just for starters

               When I was still green, I tried to start it up the “cool way”, that is I held the string in one hand and forced the saw down with the other. The saw hit my thigh. Ironically, it didn’t start, and it only tore my jeans. The only safe way to start a chain saw is to pin the saw on the ground with your boot, and then pull the string upwards.

It’s not always as fun as it looks.

For every hour I spend sawing and feeling like Paul himself, I usually spend an hour hauling brush and logs.

Chainsaws are picky eaters

Chainsaws have what is called a two stroke engine. This means that the lubrication is incorporated in the gasoline, referred to as “Mix”. My family’s business is somewhat disorganized and on one occasion a mix can was switched for regular gas can. Although there is a color difference, one of my coworkers used the regular gas in a saw. In less than a minute the engine seized up, never to run again.

Does make matter?

I usually love to buy bargain brand goods because they are not much worse than the expensive version. However when it comes to chainsaws, I find discount saws to be endlessly frustrating. The Home Depot special just doesn’t cut it (hah) if you want something reliable. My personal favorite is the Stihl brand because their saws have a high power to weight ratio, are easy to start, and don’t quit until they are out of gas.

While reading Walden by Henry David Thoreau I came to the point when he was describing why he was building a cabin near Walden Pond: “Man was not made so large limbed and robust but that he must seek to narrow his world, and wall in a space such as fitted him. He was at first bare and out of doors; but though this was pleasant enough in serene and warm weather, by daylight, the rainy season and the winter, to say nothing of the torrid sun, would perhaps have nipped his race in the bud if he had not made haste to clothe himself with the shelter of a house.” I am captivated with this perspective. I have been fascinated with the idea of shelter for a long time now; my job for the past six years or so has been focused on repairing peoples’ homes, and for even longer than that I have been building various shelters to sleep in (not all the time of course).

I would like to share with you some of my ideas regarding basic shelters. I built my first shelter when I was 10 or so, while walking through the woods and thinking a similar but simpler thought as Thoreau. The method I used this first time ended up being very viable, and I have used it with most of my shelters since. I started by finding a tree with a crotch about three to five feet off the ground. Then I searched for my main beam, which is a generally straight, long stick, four or more inches in diameter and around twelve or more feet long. One end of the beam goes in the crotch, and the other goes in the ground. Now is the time you must make sure the shelter is going to fit you, not after you have labored for hours. Next, I take sticks that act as ribs, at least one inch in diameter, and lay them from the ground to the main beam, making a tent shape. These should cover the whole beam on both sides at say a 5 inch spacing. Next, I like to gather sticks with many branches on them, and place them on the ribs to create some random cross work to support the next layer. The next layer is vegetation. I use dead leaves usually because of their light weight, good insulation value and ease of collection. I just gather handfuls and throw them on top of the cross work. My test for coverage is if you lay in the shelter during the day, there should be no light entering through the roof.

A few important notes about shelter building:

• There are limitless ways to build a shelter and this is just one
• Depending on available resources the design should be modified- improvisation is key
• I tend not to cut down anything live; dead wood is lighter and easier to get
• They don’t completely separate you from nature- I was sleeping in one I made and had a five foot snake slither out of bed with me in the morning

This first shelter I built was somewhat of a magical moment for me. The next rainy day after my shelter was erected I ran into the woods and sat in it (dry) for a long while, just thinking about my accomplishment. I had constructed something that separated me from the outdoors, and narrowed my world, using just what was naturally available.