Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Backpack Hunting What’s your most miserable night in the woods

I don’t really have one, but I thought it would make for an interesting thread. My friend got back from Colorado from an elk hunt. He shot his elk around dusk and after 4 hours of cutting it up in 5 degree weather their clothing and them were completely frozen solid. Climbed into the tent and sleeping bag frozen to the core to try to get warm. He said it was a miserable time getting that guy the 5 miles back to the truck in about a foot of snow

Not near as miserable as that. Though when I was a teenager I shot a buck in the Black Hills at dusk. The snow was deep. I wounded that buck. He kept lying down and I kept following. No moon that night I had a two cell flashlight. Maybe the fourth time I got him up I had the flashlight in my left hand and shot him as he got up. The snow there was hip deep. To get back to the truck I had to drag him through deeper snow. It was hard enough for just myself. I was back to the house when dawn was breaking.
The first elk hunt I was on was high above the Selway River. My brother and I shared a small two man tent. In the night, the snow load had crushed the tent on top of us. That story is for another day.

Actually my worst night was not in the woods but ice fishing. We were ice fishing all day drilling 14" of ice. About 8 in the evening we decided to call it a night load up the wheelers and head back to the trucks. We didn't make it 200 yards when the ice broke and swallowed my buddy his 4 wheeler and my brother. Fortunately he had huge tires which caused the 4 wheeler to float back up. They were able to climb out. I still had the other wheeler and it was hell trying to get it pulled back onto safe ice. After everyone was safe we got all of our gear to the closet island. Everything was soaked including matches and lighter. Fortunately we had a gas ice auger. We built a huge bonefire size pile of wood. Dumped out most of the gas on the wood and some on a rag. Pulled the wire off the plug and was able to light the rag by sparking the plug. That was a long sketchy night. Especially the way back to the trucks after we were warmed up

Probably once a year I get back to camp at 4 AM or so, bloody and wandering through griz country. Wonderful times….usually not in a foot of snow though.

I have spent a few unplanned nights in the woods away from camp, for various reasons. The ‘worst’ was once when fog came in and I couldn’t see where I was at, nor which drainage I needed to take to get back. It was about 0 degrees and I just hunkered up underneath a big tree, threw all my extra layers on as well as my cheap aluminum safety blanket over me and proceeded to (mildly) shiver all night. It wasn’t the Waldorf Astoria, but it wasn’t all that bad. I started hiking again once I could see the next morning.

I have never once felt I was putting myself in danger. I have been in more ‘trouble’ in the heat than I have in the cold. Hell, most of the time my ‘camp’ is just a tarp and a sleeping bag and if it is early season, I quite often don’t even have the tarp on me.

Mine was bivying out on an archery elk hunt in WY. Partner and I picked a good spot for the night, then the wind came up. Ended up moving camp to the lee side of a huge rock outcrop away from the trees.

Heard trees snapping during the night, and saw fresh broken trees as we hunted out the next day. Not a lot of sleep that night.

I maintained a luxury spike camp in a wilderness area near home for several seasons. I would go in around Labor Day and leave cooking gear, food, down bag, thermarest, bivy, etc. Then on Friday evening before season opened I could get off work and haul ass and arrive at camp, packing nothing more than rifle and day pack with the usual stuff in it. In 2002 however a very rare weather event rolled in, but I had everything to survive in comfort. Arriving at camp just after dark in a couple inches of fresh snow, around 7,500 ft, imagine the sinking feeling when I discovered everything scattered to hell and gone and destroyed. An aggressive black bear had cut the paracords holding my belongings suspended up in the high limbs and just shredded my down bag, thermarest, shelter fly, cooking gear, and canned and dried food. By this time it was 8pm or so, still snowing, the pickup was three miles and 2,000 ft below...I decided to tough it out with clothing on hand and a poncho.
A long, long night, cold, discomfort, firewood gathering, not much sleep. After a hearty breakfast of jerky and raisins I proceeded to my favorite hunting/shooting overlook...and as it began to get light, a dense fog rolled in, I mean dense, my usual 300 yard view was restricted to 30 yards. Without sight of a deer, I returned to 'camp', burned the burnables, packed up the destroyed stuff and returned to the pickup that afternoon, as tired, wet, tail dragging a derelict as you will ever see. Never to return, clearly, final score: bear 1/hunter 0.

Damn I’d be putting in for a bear tag. I think the one thing I would have done differently than my friend was have a pile of wood and kindling already gathered and ready to go. He had a beautiful camp in the tree line with lots of wood. But he went to bed and woke up to over a foot of snow. Still managed to bag a beautiful bull. But I don’t think much improves the mood over a nice warm fire

Was bird hunting in Northwest Kansas. 50 degrees and sunny, 10 mph wind. Awesome 2 days. Tent on top of a huge ridge, camp set up, chain gang for dogs, water, the works. 5pm on the second day wind flipped from the north at 40mph and blew the tent flat. Picked all the stuff up and moved to a creek bottom and literally put the tent in a dry creek bed. A fire was out, but I did have a Coleman cook stove to make coffee and a few birds I had killed on. Finally got dogs fed and laid down around midnight. Woke up the next morning to single digit temps. Sleeping bag done a good job, but it was cold enough to freeze water bottles solid.
Have had several pack outs in freezing temps while raining but they were just deer and I was never more than a few miles from my truck.
Had another time I was bird hunting along the colorado/kansas border and it was similar as the snow was gently falling and it was about 25 with no wind. Turned into an ice storm and It took me 10 hours to make a 3.5 hour drive back home that night. That sucked about as much as the freezing tent night.

Spent the night on a razor back ridge during a blizzard while elk hunting about 30 years ago.

I've had several memorable ones. One would think just one would be a learning experience, but nooo!

This was the first.

I skied the 35 mile Resurecction Trail from Hope to Cooper Landing one Christmas break when i was in college, Took it easy, with backpack and food for 4 days, staying in USFS cabins about 8 miles apart. Short daylight hours....but I'd worked much of the trail on USFS trail crew the previous summers.

17 degrees when I left Hope. Temperatures crashed the second day - by the time I got to the Devils Pass cabin (about half-way, alpine, so no firewood- fuel oil stove, but no fuel), it was still dropping. My sleeping bag was "comfort rated" to 20 below, and you know they lie about that!

The cabin had 4 bunkbeds with thin mattresses on them, I used one under me, and 3 sort of tented over me for insulation, shivering all night long. Skiing down to Juneau Creek cabin the next day warmed me up. It was still very cold, but Juneau has firewood. Three women snowmachiners were just leaving, after over-nighting there, so the cabin was toasty on my arrival.

The next day, the snow machine trail was too rough to ski, but packed, so I walked out the 10 miles or so, carrying the skies, to Gwen's Cafe in Cooper Landing. The temp there read 53 below, and it had been noticably colder up at Devils Pass. With some wind.

Note to self...Check the weather forecast , dummy!

Twice I've spent the night "sleeping" in the rocks on sheep hunts, with just my hunting gear, but not as cold as that Devils Pass night!

Once a bud and I shot a moose 2 miles back in from the truck, no established or known trails out, as it was coming on dark. By the time it was semi-dressed enough to not spoil over night, we were only able to make it about half way out before it got too dangerous to travel in deep dark, even by flashlight, and I wasn't altogether certain where we were anyway. It turned out I was spot on, but we spent the night in our light jackets, under a big dry-underneath spruce with a roaring fire just in front (lots of deadfall), in a misty rain. That one was almost comfy!

when i was a young power lineman one of my most remembered night at 11p.m. was as a lineman lots of snow maybe 2 feet or more ,below zero and some wind we had a electrical outrage because of a tree , knock wires down ,right after a major snow storm ,one of many and the transformer fuse out ,secondary lines down on ground. road was snowed shut so we hike thru a smaller woods across country we knew the area with some climbing tools ,8 foot fiber stick and a couple fuses ,handline and chainsaw . ,primary line was still hot and up ,tried a fuse on transformer twice and the transformer was burned out .so we hiked back to truck got the new 10 KVA transformer off truck ,more tools and put the 350 lb. 10 kva transformer on a aluminum scoop shovel pulled thru the woods a 1/4 mile about ,had to go back and get a rope block and tackle too . i climb up the 40 foot pole got the smaller old transformer off by hand work it was smaller transformer probably only weighed 200 lbs. , got the secondary wires back up , got the block and tackle set on pole ,climbed down help the other lineman pull the transformer up climbed back up set transformer on the bolts , hooked up all the wires . the farmer had electric again carried everything back to truck but left old transformer tel he got plowed out a few days later. we finished about 6 a.m. with his lights back on . was a cold miserable night that many power lineman know all about thru their years as a lineman , this was 40 - 45 years ago when we had no bucket trucks then we climbed every pole . i worked with some dang tuff old white linemen and was sure fun in the bar after a hard day of work too !

I am expecting to really get at it after I retire. There were some memorable events already. I spent 3 hours treading freezing water in a lake with about 120 lbs of moose quarter on my cheap ass Air Force panelwood packframe after I fell through a beaver dam after dark in the early morning hours at Mile 52 on the Richardson Highway when I was 15 years old. I was hypothermic and my finally got "the I will not die like a rat in the drum mentality"; and made my way to crawl up on the bank. The water was about 6ft deep. I was about 1/4 mile from the road and would constantly get turned around. Eventually my father built a bonfire and I went towards it and made my way out.

I also died of hypothermia during the end of moose season during 1988 I was basically helping a number of the teachers get moose in a valley up in the Upper Tyone Creek Area. It was an area that had been closed for 20 years. One perfect morning I saw 53 bull moose that were legal from the top of the ridge. I was great at processing and hauling moose. Teachers would arrive on four wheelers- get set up in the morning- and I would drill the moose after they attempted it. I had a 7 Rem Mag Remington 700 with a four power leupold scope. I had two boxes of 175 grain partition ammo. Most of the time, the moose would go down quick.

I was alone at camp at the end of the season and a strange snow storm swept in. I think it was September 18th and we were nailed by a freak winter storm. I was at 4500ft of elevation so I should have expected it. I was wearing cotton jeans and a wool jacket with a waxed cotton carhart jacket. At this time in my life I felt that I was bulletproof and didn't need a tent. I just had a tarp and I had cheap Rocky boots that I think were made out of plastic. The visability was zero and the storm started out with freezing rain.

I had heard stories of folks being stranded for months so rather than waiting for a big 60+ moose I found a 55 inch moose about 500 yards from camp. I crept up on the moose and it was just as miserable as I was. The rain was falling quickly and would freeze when it hit the ground. Everything was covered with a big layer of ice. The moose would snort and was just looking for something to wreck going from one direction to another. I snuck up to about 45 yards and punched the first 175 Partition through the mooses lungs. The Partition bullet which was primo for most everything else didn't open and just punched an icepick type hole through the moose. My personal theory is that the 5-6 inches coat of ice armor made the bullets behavior strangely. When you are set up like this and you know that it is not operator error you follow one shot with another and then another and then another. I shot that blasted moose 12 times and had 1 bullet left. The bull at this time had figured that the pain was coming from one place and wanted to get even. People talk about sometimes moose will have murder in their eyes. He saw me and headed straight away at me. I dropped the lyman leupold dot reticle between the eyes of that bullet and squeezed. He dropped instantly 20 yards away. I was out of ammo for my rifle and I had left my trusty superblack hawk Ruger revolver back at camp. I started processing the moose. I knew that I needed to get it done before it froze to the ground. I was ripping and chipping through the moose when I did my regular check of the horizon. Out of the cloud bank appeared a large sow grizzly and two larger cubs that were teen agers. She was headed right my way. I looked around and knew that I better fight than flight. I remember that bears didn't see as well and I saw an old fire-killed spruce tree with roots and I put the root complex up in the air so it was about 12 ft in the area and I went right towards the sow and cubs yelling every expletive that I knew. The bear stood tranfixed and then she woofed swapped ends and made east towards Canada. I saw her and her cubs go right out of my visibility range at 1500 yards and I never saw her again.

I carried the moose to camp where I found my tarp frozen into the ground covered with about 4 inches of ice. I built a huge fire that was about 10 ft across and just built a monster bonfire. I slept next to the fire and woke up to below zero temps with 2 ft of snow that had fallen that night. I would eat moose and then just gather wood all day and run the fire all night. I just kept there. I knew that had I tried to leave that I wouldn't make it. I was there for 8 nights. During that time I struggled with cow moose that bombed into the fire during the early morning hours when I was asleep. I also had periodic visits by the mysterious stranger who would talk to me about staying put and not trying to walk my way out. I would get cold and wet on a daily basis as I drug fire-killed spruce to my bonfire. I eventually melted a ring down into the permafrost and I made a hooch type structure using the tarp. I ate moose five times a day. People know that eating that much close to killed fresh meat gave me some interesting digestive issues but I survived.

Finally I saw a rescue helicopter buzz by and they landed in the nearby field. They looked me over and said that a rescue group on snow gos was about 1 mile out of my camp and they would be there soon and that way I wouldn't have to forfeit my moose.

I wound up being 10 days late returning to college and I suffered from some frostbite on my face. I ended up hauling the moose antlers back to college to prove during my administrative hearing that I was not just missing class on purpose. Today, if you go to the Dean's office at Harvard College you will see a set of moose horns that hang above the Dean's desk. That is where that M....F... ended up.

I had something similar happen 35 years ago. Hauled in some gear/food for a small, minimum spike camp on the opposite side of a 13’teener I was archery hunting on. Sure enough, in the pursuit of a bull and his herd I ended up on the other side of the mountain, not long till dark. No problem, go find the spike camp set up the tent, fire the Hank Robert’s backpack stove, and have some Dinty Moor stew. Bear beat me to it. And rain/snow squalls were beginning to pass through. Was able to salvage enough of the tent to make a dry shelter.
Thank goodness for Snickers bars I always carry with me.

In the pursuit of more stew, the stupid bear actually bit through the Hank Robert’s butane canister…..

Kuboku
THAT is a great story…….

That might be one of the craziest stories I’ve read on the fire. Those rocky boots sucked

👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

I have spent night's in crippling humidity and heat, merciless sub zero temps, cold and drenched in water, muggy and bug ridden nights, but the worst night I ever spent was in 1976 on the Appalachian Trail - we pulled in to a lean-to in the evening and settled in for the night. Later that evening a couple showed with a dog. Today dogs are ubiquitous, but in the 1970's (thankfully) it was fairly rare to see a hiker/backpacker with a dog. Anyway, they proceeded to tie the dog up on a short leash at the front of the lean-to. Sometime in the middle of the night barking brought me out of a deep sleep from the commotion. Then the smell. Skunk. Yup, the dog decided to tangle with a skunk, which unloaded its full arsenal right into the lean-to. I choked the remainder of the night under the merciless tyranny of that scent. I never could get all the odor out of my down bag.

I will never be a fan of dogs in the backcountry...

Wow!

Brad...That is funny.

My hunting partner and I killed two rams late in the day 80 miles from the nearest lightbulb and several from our base camp. As we came out of the basin we were in with packs full of meat the fog rolled in. It was so thick seeing 15’ was almost impossible. Knowing the terrain we were in and the dangers it posed we crawled behind a VW sized rock and spent the night getting rained and snowed on trying to keep hypothermia at bay. Long night that was.

That sounds like an epic day, Chuck.

As a teenager a pal and I were floating down the Chatahoochee river and running jugs. Well, the boat had no motor and we floated too far. Found an abandoned dock, that actually had a light on it and spent the night trying to sleep, occasional interruptions by a Moccasin swimming by, and once a batch of apparently hungry wild dogs tried to work their way down the dock. Couldnt sleep so we sat and caught frying size catfish, which were so ravenous we literally used bare hooks. Cooked a couple up without a frying pan and ate them. It wasn't cold or miserable, and it was actually a good experience.When dawn broke we managed to gather up our jugs and get back home. I remember it for two reasons 1) my parents never wondered or worried where I was or what I was doing and 2)when I got home I set a personal best record for sleeping-23 hours straight.

A few years back there was a string of somewhat unplanned nights out. Mostly it was after killing a ram, and one time after a pretty good billy. There were two nights in the same basic spot, a year or so apart. We learned after the first one that some rivers can rise a couple feet during the day close to the glaciers. And that it's way more fun to cross sketchy water in the daytime.

Spent the night in a cave after killing my double broomer, and in hindsight I'd rather pitch a tarp by a lot. Did the same after I shot my goat, and that was a very good call. Even stayed pretty dryish. Making the second trip for him sucked, but now that it is done, I'm good with it.

I think the worst night was up high, in a good cold rain, chasing a ram. Got stranded out, under a half assed tarp, and the wind kept blowing it off the anchors, which were in moss. Wearing all your layers plus rain gear is a good time. Don't overly feel the need to do that again.

Marine Corps infantry included quite a few miserable nights in snow, mountains, jungles, desert...

Then there were a few pretty miserable night stake-outs in law enforcement.

Hunting, fishing and backpacking, not too bad, though the little backpacking tent has sheltered me from rain, snow and dust storms all while "trying" to sleep. There was one night, camped with a good buddy in a crummy tent, the wind broke at least one of the poles and it fell down on us. Ya, that wasn't much fun at the time.

Good memories? Ha!

Guy

I knew I shoulda chimed-in sooner, as my tale would become ever more lame as others posted.

Such as it was...

The outfitter took pity on me eating tag soup in 2006, so he went out himself with me in 2007 in the East Kutenays. We called-in 4 bulls through the day, one to within 10'. I couldn't discern a 6th point on either side, so I sat motionless 'til he wandered off. At last, last, LAST light, I dropped a 6x5, & we commenced to dressing him. The process took about 75' of elevation, as he kept sliding downhill. In the meantime, the bushes rocked several times, causing us to drop everything & grab rifles. I'd been warned repeatedly about grizzly concentrations in the North Fork of the Flathead, so my butt puckered a good bit each time.

Well after dark we had elk parts 'n pieces perched in the brush, & took stock of where (and when) we were. We figured it would be best to stay put, rather than wander the mountain in the darkness. Still, it got chilly, & firewood was scarce in that area. We decided to head toward where we thought the road should be, & see what happened. As I stumbled along deleriously, I laughed at the folly of our having taken a lengthy meat bath, only to wander for hours in the dark through grizzly country. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

We hit the road around 4 am, found the truck by 5, & got to camp by 6. By 7 the horses were loaded, & we went back to load-out the meat. I think it ended up being a 30 hour hunt, but we still had all of our limbs, & my very first elk back in camp.

It's one of the few times I've ever been too tired to sleep, & too hungry to eat. And it was glorious.

FC

My first western hunt, 2015 public land Colorado 2nd Rifle. We waltzed in thinking we were gonna be dodging elk in the national forest like we had in the Chama Valley. Unit 77 was ours…little did we know it was pretty much everyone else’s, too.

The hike in wasn’t bad. 5 miles didn’t seem like a lot, even with the thin air and clouds on the horizon. And the pack guide we had paid to take the bulk of our Victorian safari-esque pack list got us a spot a good distance from the nearest hunters…at least 150 yards!! But my boot did get a little wet, which at this point didn’t matter because tomorrow morning I’d be tagged out. I wouldn’t have time to get a blister…

The first morning was promising and the wind was in my face as I sat watching a wide, grassy burn atop a high, flat ridge. My back was to a sheer cliff and in the valley below was our tent. A spec in the distance.

Elk sign was everywhere. The first animal to walk by was a coyote at first light. I let him pass because I was sure I could hear a herd of elk behind him. Unfortunately it was 8 hunter orange clad members of the same family. One was a rather hefty mother and father, which didn’t make sense because I had sincerely tested my fit 31 year old body getting to my spot before sunup. Locals. Acclimation, I thought.

They had parked 400 yards from where I was sitting. I hiked 2 miles and 1,400’ to get there. “Next year just park at the gate.” Don’t worry! I was invited to camp with them and 46 other individuals who were hunting this same ridge (and in the same family!) next year.

After walking a mile down the ridge to my buddy and exchanging stories regarding the various branches of the same family tree we had interacted with that morning, we decided to lunch at the tent and hike further down that evening since distance from civilization was our friend. We read about that and it had to be true.

I could handle this disappointing deviation from expectations given how utterly beautiful our trip had been to that point. I was going to persevere, despite the unwanted camaraderie.

Then it started to rain. And rain. And rain. 5 straight days of steady, wet rain. My boots and blisters were fully soaked. Our clothes were not drying. Visibility was less than 200 yards, like it even mattered. There were no animals. We made a 1,200 yard stalk on a bull elk the next to last afternoon to finally get within range to identify a mule tied to a tree. There weren’t even chipmunks to steal our food. Simply me, Russell, and hundreds of other hunters.

The last night, knowing we had been thoroughly defeated, we agreed to get in bed and hike out the next morning. That felt like a shallow victory though we knew it was really a sad defeat. We would walk out with our packs empty and our heads held high, looking failure in its face and daring it to call us what we really knew we were down deep in our hearts. We were pansies. Defeated, overmatched losers. We were failures. But at least we knew it!

We turned into the tent, and as we did we saw stars for the first time in 6 nights. Odd we thought. We drifted off to sleep as a cool, still night settled darkly over our camp beside the swollen creek feeding the Piedra River. We slept soundly, safely under the overwatch of pine trees that had stood for decades if not longer. Tomorrow will be a good day.

About an hour in to a deep, albeit damp and shivering sleep, the sound of a freight train awoke me. It was quite deafening, but at the same time I couldn’t tell if it was very loud or very quiet. I just couldn’t hear. I turned on the lamp and could see Russell’s mouth moving, but no sound was coming out. He was obviously yelling but he couldn’t compete with the racket outside. All of a sudden I could hear the steadfast pine trees coming down all around us. The rain fly on the tent was trying to come through the tent. I didn’t know if the neighbors had finally gone mad and were tormenting us or if we were being attacked by a den of bears. I had read there were bears here.

I’m from Oklahoma. Bad weather doesn’t frighten me. I was effing terrified.

For about 30 minutes, or maybe three, this went on. Finally the crashing stopped and the tent quit quivering. The noise abated and the hoarse words coming out of Russel’s mouth started making sense. Water was coming through hundreds of new holes in our rain fly. We slowly opened our tent door to 12” of hail. Everything in the valley was white, but not from snow. 1/4” hail was everywhere. Hail was up over 2’ high on the side of our tent. I stepped out to just below my knee in pea sized hail. It was breathtaking.

The next morning we left a note on a thoroughly soaked piece of paper for our horse guide to grab our stuff and call us when he got in. We didn’t much care to ever go back so we didn’t figure needing any of our gear except our rifles and binocs. Most of our gear was completely waterlogged so we couldn’t take all we came in with on our backs and the horses would have to pick up the slack. We hiked out in record time and straight to Pagosa Brewing. We each ordered hamburgers, wings, and a ton of beer. Two days later our crap was at the outfitters and we piled it into my truck.

Took me 5 years to go back. Now I can’t get enough of it.

One time my valet forgot to pack my cashmere slippers. Most uncomfortable night ever.

Seriously though, you guys have had some truly miserable nights afield!

Been a few for me, but the one that still rankles is when my wife and I were out on a local property (Bagomba) just out of town in winter shooting rabbits for coin.
We had a good load of some eighty pair from memory when I drove through some irrigation runoff that was hidden in the long grass. The loaded 2.8 litre diesel Hilux hit the diffs as soon as I heard the water.
That was early in the night and I spent the next few hours digging to no avail...then I came up with the bright idea of jacking the truck up and piling rabbit carcases under it. If you are ever in this predicament do yourself a favour and DON'T do this...the wheels chewed through those carcases like a mincer and left me sitting in a great big wet hole filled with a mud/mince concoction.
We were stuck so my wife had a sleep in the front of the vehicle and I lay on the back amongst the mud, blood, mince. During the night it decided to rain and when the sun hit the horizon every damned blowfly in the district found us.
A couple of very uncomfortable hours later the cocky drove up in his Landcruiser and pulled us out...THEN was rude enough to just drive back through the bloody great mess we had been stuck in, and didn't even look like getting stuck.

Last time my wife came out on the Rabbits with me, and I cannot say I blame her.

Waking up with water in the tent is always fun......

One of my first forays into tent camping, we set up in a "nice little cleared spot" it rained hard all night and it turned out our nice spot was in a depression. We had prob 1" water in the tent and simply sat there waiting for the lightening to quit. It was a long night. I was about 15 at the time and learned a good lesson in site prep.

I also spent a night in temps in the teens with a '20 deg' sleeping bag. EN rating took on new meaning for me after that. I wasn't anywhere near hypothermia but sat there with all my clothes on waiting for daylight, kind of sucked.

Also spent a night with a camp visitor that wasn't afraid of being yelled at, headlamps, or apparently anything else. Judging by the tracks, I'd say a 200 lb black bear. Our campsite wasn't his first visit. There is something about having a large creature walking around your tent in the dark, only separated by nylon.

Lots of good info on how to make the unexpected cold and wet night more survivable was discussed here:

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/topics/1105065/surviving-a-cold-wet-night

Being sick is the worst. I watch my kids pretty close now a week or so prior to leaving to see what kind of crap they are bringing home from various things they attend.

I almost had a close call this year. Soaked sleeping bag and tent. Going to get new stuff for next year.

Some good stories, and these stories make great memories, don't they?

When I was doing the mountain phase of ranger school we had an unexpected freezing rain and snow storm hit when we were patrolling. We didn't have good field gear, cotton field pants and field jackets, no ECWG back then. We were patrolling, so no sleeping bags or shelter halves. Some of us had ponchos with poncho liners tied onto them, but not enough to go around, not even any plastic wet weather gear. It was the worst night that I ever spent in the woods, but it graphically proved the truth of "mind over matter", that you could survive if you had the will to survive or you could die if you didn't.

Mine mirrors 260Rem although at Ft Benning OBC, light week, freezing heavy rain, lost PL, laying on the ground for several hours while the PL un "F'd" himself. Absolutely nothing was dry, even under those stupid ripstop ponchos we were drenched and not moving. Un believably cold....

I served in ARNG as an armored recon scout, as did my BIL. I was in graduate school and he had a beer truck route and we both were unable to attend summer camp with our unit in July. His boss had requested that he be allowed to run his route cos of beer sales during July 4 and I was in graduate school and taking exams. We were detached to another unit and another date for our summer camp. Summer camp was at Camp Shelby, extremely hot and humid, and tank trails ground to 3’ of fine silt by the tracks turned to deep mud. The Scouts still had open jeeps and BIL had misplaced much of his field gear. No poncho, canteen, nothing and thunderstorms every afternoon and thru the nights. The skitters are our state bird. BIL discovered that they had a shortage of tankers and excess numbers of scouts. Volunteered us to be tankers, thinking the tanks would be warm, dry and skitter proof. I received 2 minutes of driving instruction before going on an 18 mile road march in the night, no lights, on roads 3’ deep in mud during severe thunderstorms and tornado warnings. Googles were useless and my face and eyes were covered in gritty mud. I was told not to touch anything metal in case of a lightning strike. Water dripped all night resembling a Chinese water torture and it rained all night long. The other 2 tankers had hammocks strung and were moderately comfortable. Skitters love dark places like the interior of a tank. What a damn miserable night. Every surface was hard metal and no no way to get comfortable. I had scrapes and bruises all over. I had to see a medic to get grit rinsed from my eyes. I have no desire to ever be a tanker. Too much misery

Took my boys on a winter overnight, when they were ages 6 and 11. They were veteran pack in campers at that age but not in the winter.

I broke trail back into our property with snowshoes and they followed along. We set up camp on the edge of some white pines with hardwoods across the small clearing. We cut pine bows to build up a layer under the tent, then shoveled snow up around the sides of the tent. Tent plus all the bags and wool blankets we had was cozy in that arrangement, despite no source of heat inside.

We spent the evening before bed around a goodly sized fire and cooking food. In the morning we built the fire back up and cooked a good breakfast, then headed home.

The boys were never miserable, but I was that night, all night. See, I was under threat of divorce to not let a single f'ing (her words) thing happen to the wife's boys. I stayed awake all night listening to them breath, and snore, prepared to bail at a moments notice if something went sideways. Nothing did and they were just as happy when they woke up as they were going to sleep. I spent the entire night warm and cozy in my bag fighting every second to stay awake. That was a LONG miserable night. Still ended up divorced, but not over that.

To this day they recall that overnight as one of the coolest things they ever did when they were kids.

Oh, and it got down to 35 below that night, a might chilly..........

hawaii. 1982.
camped on the beach for a night.
storm blew in and knocked down our tent. couldnt get it back up in the wind, flashlights went dead, so we gave up. it was so hot we slept on top of the tent. crabs came out at night and pinched our toes and fingers all night.
we gathered up our stuff, hiked out, and slept in the car.

2007 PWS AK. I had packed out of our cabin to find the boat and bring it into a different, more sheltered cove. THat night, a squall hit. November, cold, high winds, on a salt water inlet in the open cabin aluminium boat. I have never been that cold again, ever and if I have any say in the matter - I will never again be that cold while breathing. For that matter - I'll have them cremate me nice and toasty.

I am sure all of you still have a smile on your face every time you think of that trip

A smile then, and a smile now.

That little trip taught them that nothing is impossible. Be prepared, and get it done. Them being hooked on The Outdoors made it so much easier. They both are tough and true men now in their mid and late 20s respectively. Men that I greatly admire.

Had a night on Kodiak deer and bear hunting where the rain was near horizontal, and the wind had the Cabela's 9 man? tent in a teardrop. I was on the windward side, and on top of getting moisture from contact with the tent, was freezing from the wind taking heat away.

Too much wind to light a stove safely.

Wet and cold.

I hate that.

Backpacking on the Appalachian Trail in GA. Settled into my tent with two buddies. I took a direct lightning strike inside the tent. They were three feet from me and didn’t get popped. Tent disintegrated. Legs messed up, couldn’t walk. Soaked by the storm. Somehow crawled/hopped into a ravine at lower elevation and slept there that night in a sopping wet sleeping bag.

Got struck on Blood Mountain….how about that?

I posted this a while ago, but the most miserable and scariest night in the mountains was a mid-late aug sheep hunt in northern BC in 2016. Here’s what I posted in another thread.

We use either a Hilleberg Nalo 3 GT or a Golite SL 4 modified to use 6” Ti Goat cylinder stove on our yearly Stone sheep hunts here in BC.
In 2016 we were camped high up on the side of a mountain with no cover and a storm hit over night. It was the worst storm I’ve ever experienced. We were using the Hilleberg. Extreme wind with driving snow. One corner of the tent pulled up in the wind in the middle of the night. We were trying to hold everything down from the inside in complete darkness. Finally got it restaked but it had badly bent one pole and luckily didn’t break it. It was below freezing but the humidity was so high and the wind so violent that it was a constant mist storm inside the tent. All we could do was zip up in our bags and shiver the night away hoping the tent would hold up. Our bags were very wet and we were very close to hypothermia. Glad it only lasted one night. Got up the next morning to snow everywhere. We decided to head out of the mountains and it snowed and rained for the next 5 days but without much wind.
Long winded story but I don’t think the Golite would have stood up to that, and the results could have been deadly. Ever since then I just can’t bring myself to take tipi and stove on a sheep/goat hunt.

That’s amazing, and tops my experience for sure.

Lightening strikes in the mountains, particularly when you're exposed above tree-line, is a danger that people who aren't familiar with mountain storms often don't even know to plan for. I carry a bamboo walking stick when we hike above tree-line in Colorado, as the aluminum alloy trekking poles that many people favor can act like lightening rods in that environment.

In the early 70's myself and a friend were hunting ducks very far back up in the marsh above the Trinity Bay head near Houston. Going in and the day before there was a very strong south wind blowing which filled the marsh and allowed us to penetrate very deeply with a conventional boat and motor, 16 ft aluminum and 20 horse in our case. About mid-morning a very strong (30+ mph wind; driving rain and later sleet) front blew in at the same time as the tide fell and the whole marsh drained. We were trapped as the boat wouldn't float enough that we could pole out. The rain eventually slaked off but the temps went down into the low 20's that night. We ended up huddled behind some tall marsh grass clumps overnight. We were dressed well but it sure wasn't fun.
Folks knew where were hunting but they were getting anxious by the time we finally got out about late afternoon the next day.

Just a scare. A night in the Minam Wilderness (NE Oregon after elk). A tornado of sorts came through midnight with the classic train roar coming down the canyon. Sheared off three very large live tamarack each landing literally within feet on three sides of our wall tent. No damage to tent or picketed horses, but any and all could have been squashed the two of us like a bug. Never went back to that site.

WOW! Some great stories and some tough experiences. Kaboku's is a zinger!
 
I’ve slept on the ground over 300 nights of my life, 11 of those unplanned. Several of those were with no tent/sleeping bag, and yet I can’t think of any that were truly miserable, even one in a damp/wet sleeping bag in a violent sleet storm. Synthetic bag felt like a sauna but was warm.

A fearful night was spent in a goat bed with pebbles falling from the cliff above. I tried to do too much before dark and found myself on the dead end of the goat trail in pitch dark. The only safe course was to stop in the only level spot, not quite as big as my bod. I had pad, sleeping bag and a tarp to roll around my pack and myself. If it had started raining, bringing down more and larger rocks, I planned to crawl down and around the fearsome steep talus below me, to get away from the impact zone at the base of the cliff, and hope there was no cliff dropping off below.

Tag. Good stories to read later

Wanna say I've been plenty wet, and cold a few times
And I've spent nights in cold wet conditions, properly equipped and relatively comfortable
Knock on wood; Never had the kind of failure or circumstance that left me dangerously wet and cold overnight

My dad and I never got along all that well, but if he were alive today I'd thank him for his pessimistic sour attitude. The man taught me that everything that might go wrong, should be expected
The man died decades before the saying "Two is one and one is none" was coined. But that's how he lived (of course, my brother and I carried everything extra)

The ex and I were walking the bluffs near the sea caves at Meyers Beach on Superior's south shore. We had stopped at a Gander in Wausau on our way up, and she'd bought an aluminum hiking staff.
Big thunderstorm was rolling in fast, and the lightning was close enough to be a real concern. She began moving almost carelessly fast trying to get off the bluffs and back to the Suburban. She looked back at me and yelled, "Can't you keep up?" I yelled back that "I maybe could, but you're the one carrying the lightning rod"...

If I had a pic of her face, right then...

Thought it would be a good idea to moose hunt in a September flood tide in 1984, up the Little Susitna River starting at Port of Anchorage and running across the Cook Inlet! In one of those narrow bow 17 ft Grizzly boats with the little inboard 2 strokes! Used up about 1/2 our fuel trying to find the Little Sue in the braided inlet! Made it in the river went quite a ways upstream and anchored up.
About midnight we were drifting back into the inlet with flood logs and debris no lights, got the boat going and went back upstream in a flood tide, to a tidal gut and re anchored. Tidal guts are narrow and steep but do not look that way when tide is in, bottom nothing but silt, think quicksand, you cant step out of the boat, big mistake.

Spent 6 lovely hrs when the boat went hi and dry at an angle where we had to brace ourselves to keep from sliding, lots of fun, then 6 more hrs waiting for the tide wondering if the narrow stern would float or swamp. Boat floated and we went home, have not been back in the upper Cook Inlet since 1984!

Native boats that run those waters are wide in the stern and bow to refloat if boat goes hi and dry, ours was not!

Flood tides in the Cook inlet can exceed 32 ft second highest in the world as I recall.

Bore tides
https://www.alaska.org/advice/alaska-bore-tide

Spent 4 plus years in the USMC, all infantry. Too many miserable nights and days spent out to count. Frostbite in Korea, 6 inches of rain in 3 hours at LeJeune, leeches and vampire bats in Panama, lightening strikes and tornadoes at Fort Pickett, a few nights trying to catch a few minutes of sleep on top of a pile of rubble that was a barracks building in Beirut.
Lots of miserable nights..... that last one still causes a sleepless night occasionally.

Special Forces: 29 years and many parachute jumps. February near Khe Sanh, 1971. Mortars
and various flavors of incoming rounds. There is always somethin in a combat zone that will keep you cussin or prayin".

Had the folks took the dog in with them like they should have, it would have been a non issue. People ain't to bright most times.

As for me, I dont have a single miserable night in the woods, ever. Came out on the wrong road once when I was 18 and walked miles to find a logger that knew where are car was... I also was flathead catfishing about 25 yrs. ago in July. I had the tent and campfire all going just fine and was noticing there sure is a lot of fireworks out that way for no town being near there. it got closer and realized it was a big thunder storm coming in.. I high tail it down the river at night and i was plenty good enough to have my boat on plain , until it started raining . When rains hits the river water , it makes it impossible to see where the sand bars are. I got caught on a big sand bar and could not see where the deeper water was so I push the boat up stream and found my way out i a lightning storm and was drenched and cold , .. I am always very careful and rarely get remotely in trouble.

Kk, spent the night across the inlet high and dry with my new bride (now much happier ex-bride) 4th of July, maybe 07 or 08. It was rather awkward, and I do recall a discussion about how if the boat didn't float, I'd not have the chance to drown, as I would be suffering from lead poisoning.

Too many to count. Everything from wild horses and venomous snakes to frostbite and rhabdo.

I caved with the NSS for about 5 years.

In 1983, I was on an expedition that was mapping Fisher Ridge Cave. It's now part of the Mammoth system. Back then it was separated from Mammoth by another system.

I went in with 4 other guys. Two guys brought in tools to widen out a hole in the wall that had been felt to be blowing, so it was assumed there was more cave on the other side. I went with a another two guys back to the furtherest part of the known cave and map it using a compass and inclinometer. While I was back in a passage about 100 meters, my carbide light got blown out. I relit it and it promptly blew out again with a breeze coming the other direction. When I came back out the two guys with me were white-faced with fear. There must me one hell of a storm going on, and they knew we had to skedaddle. As we retraced our steps, dry cave started to drip. Drips were now streams. Streams were torrents. We had about 4 hours of this before we reached the exit. There was no sign of the other two guys. I was the junior of the bunch, so they had me go out first. The egress was through 100 meters of hand-and-knees crawl with influx water. The water was coming up fast. I ran out of ceiling with about 10 feet to go before daylight. I sucked some air off the roof and went for it. The two guys behind me found a crease and floated out on their backs. The two guys behind them didn't make it out.

I was told to stay at the entrance and help the two guys if they tried to make it out, while the other two guys went for help. While standing at the entrance in the rain, I heard an ominous rushing sound and look back up the stream in the gathering gloom of twilight and saw a 3 foot wall of water coming down the valley. I threw myself on some roots and managed to get up out of the entrance before I got sucked in. At this point, the two guys still in were either drowned or they had gone deep and high in the cave and were safe. I went up out of the ravine about 50 meters, stripped off my wet gear and got under a poncho. Another thunderstorm came through about 2200. All of a sudden I heard the back of my neck sizzle and before I could investigate, lightning struck an oak tree about 10 meters off.

That was enough for me. I met the rescue team about halfway back to the road and told them there was nothing to be done at the entrance. It was dumped shut. I got to go back and tell one of our fellow cavers that her husband of ten years and her current lover were flooded in. My buddy and I stayed up with her at a Carters restaurant all night. At first light, I was packing for the rescue trip when I was informed I was scratched because of obvious fatigue. My buddy went. There was another entrance to the cave and conceivably the two missing cavers could be reached by that route. About noon the rescue team showed back up with the two guys. They had been about 15 minutes behind us, and seen a wall of water coming down the entrance passage and closing it off. They beat it back, but took a wrong turn and almost had the water get ahead of them. They finally made dry cave after an hour or two.

NSS cavers know to carry a big leaf bag and three plumbers candles as a latch-ditch measure. You crawl into the bag, sit with your knees up around your chin and light a candle. It's enough heat to keep you from dying from hypothermia. The two guys were down to their last stub of candle when found-- 15 hours.

Wow that is amazing, so the two guys made it out alive. That’s incredible I’ve ton my share of caving and it definitely makes my balls tingle. I can not imagine underwater caving where crap can really go bad quick

Nothing too extreme in the least, but inconvenient it was. It was "chilly" for southern Az, slightly below freezing. I had a pretty good battle with the runs, spilled water on my sleeping bag, and didn't have a level bed, or a decent pillow.

Yes. Nobody died on that trip.

If they had been directly behind us, they'd have drowned when the egress flooded shut. They saw a wall of water coming at them and ran. The problem was they ran in the wrong direction and ended up in a blind room above the entrance. When they figured out their mistake, they had to go back down through the flood water to get to the right passage. I know where they ended up. We marched through a section of dry cave at one point. It showed signs of being dry for 1,000 years or more.

One of the two guys had been flooded in 10 years earlier. He and a woman got into a tall room and the water rose and cut them off from leaving. They huddled up at the ceiling and watched the water rise for a day and a half before finally stopping and going back down. When they were rescued, the first thing they did was divorce their spouses and marry each other. That was the potential widow I was up with at the Jerry's.

I was tasked with writing an article on what happened, and it got published in the journal. I took a lot of heat. I asserted that I had seen thunder and lightning on the horizon as we were going into the cave. Some people claimed that would never have happened. The NSS would never conduct a trip with bad weather imminent. There were some reputations on the line, specifically the two older guys I was with. They'd been at it for decades. I was a relative newbie.

One funny thing from the trip. I was with these two older guys, way the hell back. This was still in the days of carbide lights. One fellow had his light go out and he turned to the other and said "Dave, give me a kiss."

When they turned and looked at me, I was plastered up against the wall with a frightened look on my face. I didn't know that meant to put two helmets together and get the other carbide lamp relit.

Too many instances of misery. one recent example on a winter caribou hunt by dog team:

Accidentally grabbed a 0 degree sleeping bag, looked identical to my 30 below bag. Was better than 40 below zero when I slept on the trail. Shivered all fkn night. Woke up first light and felt so disoriented that I felt drunk.

Could barely get a fire started. My spleen and core muscles were convulsing so violently, I couldn't do anything with any sort of dexterity. Couldn't get snowshoes on my feet. Snow was too deep to scrounge for wood.

A fkn flint, and a bottle of yellow heet got me core temp up. Luckily, my camp stove was pre-packed with a little bit of wood. I ate a frozen stick of butter and melted snow. Drank about a half gallon of scalding hot water with butter in it.

Back in mother fkn business!

Camping with a bunch of Boy Scouts in a wilderness area in East Tennessee. No rain at all in the forecast so we were set up fairly close to a river. Woke up about 2:00 am basically floating around on an air mattress in the tent. Packed everybody up and headed out with it just pouring . Accidentally found an electric fence that we didn't see on the way in > Major Bummer. Kinda mild compared to most previous posts but it's really the only bad experience I ever had camping.

I want to know what to look for to know a cave area has been dry for appx 1000 years. LOL

Probably could’ve stopped after your second sentence ha ha. Winter caribou hunting by dogs team sounds pretty hard core.

That's a good question. You have to know the layout of the cave and how it relates to where the water is running. You may be 200 feet underground, but if the water never gets above 300 feet, that part of the cave may be bone dry. Given that it may take 10000 years for water to cut through a layer of rock and turn it into a tunnel big enough to crawl through, that bone-dry section of cave may have been like that for a good long time.

I'm not a karst geologist, but the one thing I learned to recognize was a fine, powdery sand/clay mix in these dry rooms. If water hits clay, the clay expands. When it dries, it cracks. It takes a long time for the top layer of clay to degrade so that there is nothing left but dust. That's with no wind, no rain, in the dark for centuries. This is also one of the most stable places in the cave. The room is usually rock solid, because it has no water impinging on it. Rooms like this are preferred for overnight camping and (for the more adventuresome) underground horizontal mamba lessons. You just have to bring a tarp, because that fine particulate gets into everything.

I honestly did not like camping underground. It was a lot of trouble to get a sleeping bag a mile or two back. At 50F and 100% humidity, hypothermia is a constant companion. As far as the other, I had one adventurous cave woman decide to take me to one of those dry rooms. She admitted later that she'd planned the whole weekend just to get me back there. When we got to the dry room, she announced her intentions by dropping all her gear. It was a bit like doing it on the beach.

Most miserable nights I can remember was on a DIY Manitoba moose hunt up the Bloodvein river by canoe, late September of 1973. Nice fall weather when we headed out but turned bitter cold the second day out. I had packed light, including my sleeping bag, and wore everything I had that was dry to sleep in but still shivered all night for the remainder of that trip. I still remember the pleasure of getting up in the mornings and trying to get dressed in outer clothing frozen stiff as a board. Oh yeah, we never saw a Moose

Gotcha. Didn't realize every conversation ends up in sex. I guess so these days.

Beach. Ugh. don't like sand. Would not like sex around sand. Just sand please go away. Like you said it gets into everything and its a PITA.

This was (gosh!) 40-some years ago. It was before AIDS. It was also the NSS. This was dangerous business and it attracted a certain type. It's a bit like alpine climbing in the dark without all the ropes, and death at 50F comes a lot slower. I got into it, because I designed a lighting system for filming 16mm in a cave. My buddy only told me I was going in the cave with the rig after I was up to my neck. I dug the vibe and stuck with it for 5 years.

A simple broken arm could kill you or, worse, put a whole team in jeopardy. We were under strict orders that, should an accident occur underground, we NOT alert the local authorities. We had an 800 number. It rang to a 24/7 nationwide rescue team that was on call to fly in and get you out. While I was active, there was one death. Somebody slipped into a crevasse and their helmet caught. They strangled on their chin strap before anyone could get to them. It was two married couples and lifelong friends on that trip.

While I was still caving, I got a call. The University of Cincinnati had put a team down the hole and the cave had flooded. Somebody had erroneously leaked that I was the 5th unnamed member of the party, and it went out on the national news wires. Everyone thought I was in there, although I was sitting at home, warm and happy. That made for a strange call to my parents.

Truth of it was, the 5 members had anticipated flooding and prepositioned stuff in sealed 55 gallon drums for such an occasion. This trip was way over my head, because it required scuba. After 2 weeks, the flood subsided and they swam out.

I never got checked out as a cave diver, because. . . well, I kept a poster in my bathroom for years




I could never see a way out with cave diving.

In the mid '70s I worked and lived at a Forest Service Ranger Station in northern Montana, just south of Eureka, MT. The Forest Service had a Fire Lookout tower on top of the highest mountain behind the Ranger Station.

During grouse season, I often hunted the tops of the ridges around that Lookout tower. On one hunt I spotted a huge mule deer buck and decided to come back and look for him when deer season opened.

So deer season opens, and my ex-wife and i drive around the mountain and up to the Fire Lookout tower. We park my pickup at the tower and head down the ridge in the direction that I had seen the big buck.

About mid day we hadn't seen that buck, but I find a nice 5x5 bull elk. Deer and elk season was concurrent, so I shoot the bull elk. We go ahead and dress him out and quarter him, and instead of just leaving him there and go home to get my horses, I decide to pack one quarter down the mountain.

The road that we came in on follows the Stillwater River, and I figure that my elk is in a small drainage that is just about straight above the bridge where the road crosses the river. So I strap one 85# hind quarter on to the cheap aluminium pack frame that we had, and tie the 5x5 antlers on top of the pack. I told my wife to go back to the truck and drive down to the bridge and I would meet her there. And I grab my 10# rifle and start down the steep draw to the river.

It was probably about a mile straight down that draw to the river, but the draw was steeper that I expected, and the alder and other brush was very thick. I fell a few times going down, and tombled a couple of times. One time the aluminium pack frame broke.

By the time that I reached the bottom of the mountain it was pitch black, it was drizzling rain, and the valley bottom on the side of the river was marshy and full of beaver dams. My ex wife was at the bridge, and we could call to each other, but it was too dark to try to cross that swamp, especially with that heavy pack. So I called to her and told her to come back in the morning.

I then found a dry spot under a spruce tree where I could be out of the rain, and built a small fire from all of the small dead branches at the bottom of the tree. I cut a few strips of meat from the elk quarter and cooked them over the fire. Throught the night I would stoke up the fire, replenish my stash of wood, and get a little sleep until the fire died down and I would wake up shivering.

At daylight the next day, my wife and my boss came back to the bridge. With daylight I could easily find a dry way to the bridge and it only took me about 5 minutes to get there.

The rest of that trip, and coming back with my horses to get the rest of the elk were uneventful, and actually quite easy.

My dad spent 1944-45 "backpack hunting" in northern Europe during the battle of Hurtgen Forest and the Battle of the Bulge. He said every night was misersable, especially when he was listed as MIA during the first week+ of the Bulge.

4th infantry division, 22nd infantry Regiment. (Silver Star with oak leaf cluster, Bronze Star with oak leaf cluster- both with "V" for valor device, Purple Heart with oak leaf cluster, Presidential Unit Citation, ETO campaign medal with 3 stars).

How was your backpacking hunting trip?

My dad backpacked and island hopped in the South Pacific fighting the Japanese, hand-to-hand in some cases. He was awarded a bunch of medals, including a Presidential Unit Citation which is equivalent to the Crosses but awarded to a unit rather than an individual.


Oops, sorry wrong thread.

and I appreciate both of ya'lls dads for their sacrifice

January 25, 1985. I was on an ROTC field training exercise. Temp dropped to -3 degrees. That was actual temperature, not the windchill. With windchill, it was even lower. Spent the night in a canvas army tent, in an army sleeping bag. So cold, as many as 4 cadets slept in one tent to try and stay warm.

Same unit as my grandfather.

Boy scouts when I was 14. Scoutmaster took us on a survival camp 5 days. We could bring a blanket a pancho, a canteen, and fishing tackle. Camped in the woods on the edge of an oxbow lake east of town. It was a good lesson. River was high and muddy and backed into the oxbow.
Fish wouldn't bite. We did catch a bunch of turtles on a trotline he set out. We had one pot to boil water to drink and he gave us 2 matches each for starting fires. We had no food. Ate turtle meat and turtle livers cooked on a stick. We did manage to catch a couple of grinnels so we had fish on a stick. It rained most of the nights and the.mosquitos were awful. We were all wet all night most nights. I was glad when it was over. Good experience though.

Shaman, some great stories.
I was in mammoth caves as a kid, always wanted to go back.

I was with my family and we were on a guided tour. Pretty cool nonetheless.

I always thought it was called spelunking?

Backpacking trip with two college friends, Dolly Sods wilderness area in WV mid-1970s
Started out with light snow and 20F
About 12 miles in, it started to rain on day three........in those days rag sweaters and down bags were the norm; no Gore-tex available
That night, temps dropped to near 0F. Weather forecast on the ol' Panasonic transistor radio projected teens and lower for the next two+ days.
We made a one-day (and night) forced march back.
Walking bridge across the river, within sight of the parking lot, had washed out.
Actually pretty dangerous situation once we realized our situation

Man you all have had some rough times, it's been fun to read through all the posts. As for myself I've spent a lot of cold wet nights out in the field but nothing like all of the stories I've read on this thread.

I took a good friend of mine on his first backpack hunt 10 or so years ago. We were looking for elk as he had never taken a good bull. It was cold, about 18 below without the wind and the first night we were there we got on a group of bulls with a pretty nice 6 point in the bunch. He couldn't get a shot that night but I figured if we toughed it out for a day or two he'd get a crack. He woke up the next morning and said the hell with this and he was heading home...lol he hasn't went on a backpack hunt since.

Gotta say this has been one of the better threads I've read through lately, hope the stories keep coming in.