The night, the forest and the stars

SARAH Freeman reports on how to get by on nothing in deepest and darkest North Yorkshire.

One man has fashioned a cooking stove from a Thermos flask and a tent peg. Another shows off a set of knives he has made himself. I have also brought a kit bag packed with essentials for spending 24 hours in the great outdoors. It contains two scotch eggs, a pork pie and a bag of miniature cheeses.

While there are few survival situations which can’t be made better by some well- chosen savoury items, when another of those who has signed up for the Bushcraft for Beginners weekend at Dalby Forest introduces himself as a local farrier and reveals a giant hacksaw, I can’t help but feel a little under-prepared.

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The course was born out of an event the Forestry Commission still runs for children which teaches them how to build basic shelters. When mums and dads, but mainly dads, began refusing to leave their offspring to it, preferring instead to spend an afternoon building dens, ranger Mark Barker realised there was a market for an adults-only course, which would also involve an overnight stay in the forest. The aim was to give people who usually see the countryside from a picnic table the chance to sample the great outdoors for real.

Mark insists no experience is necessary, but most of the 10 or so who are waiting to try out their latest Swiss Army knife, already look like they are on intimate terms with Ray Mears. Two of them even have camouflage baseball hats.

It’s not that I don’t like camping. I do, so long as the tent is pitched within walking distance of a pub. At Dalby’s bushcraft camp, just a short drive from the main visitor centre, not only is there no pub, there are no toilets, no showers and you have to build your own accommodation.

“Honestly, anyone can do this,” says Mark, with the quiet understatement of a man who did this kind of thing for real during his years in the Armed Forces. “It’s about teaching people new skills, it’s about letting them try out some of their own gear, but more than anything it’s about enjoying yourself.”

The fun begins with building our bedroom for the night.

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“We’ve left this one here just to give you a few ideas,” adds Mark, pointing to a leafy mound in the shape of a giant Toblerone. It turns out it’s exactly the sort of shelter soldiers are taught how to build when they join up. “The first thing is to find a spot you’re happy with and go from there. You can build whatever type of shelter you like, but the best advice is to keep it simple.” That’s it. No instruction booklet, no nails, no hammer. Just two bits of blue rope and the forest floor to scavenge for materials.

My husband, who arrived home the previous night having parted company with a significant amount of cash at a local outdoors shop, says we shouldn’t unpack our inflatable pillows, insulated cups and shiny new pocket cutlery sets just yet.

He has also deliberately left the miniature cheeses in the boot of the car. As two townies, we need to at least attempt to look like we know what we are doing. By the time we have selected the site for our leafy des res – far enough away from the main camp fire to feel like we’re in the wild, but close enough not to have to walk too far for hot water – the rest are already well on.

The farrier constructs his at lightning speed, but a little later it nearly burns down just as quickly when his rather ambitious fire gets out of control. Another shelter collapses when a supporting branch snaps. So remembering the old fable of the hare and the tortoise we begin.

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A couple of hours later, a thousand branches, twigs and leaves have been transformed into a... well, it’s really just a sloping wall, but it’s our sloping wall and the only thing that will stand in the way of us and the showers which have been forecast for later on the evening.

It might not have the jaw-dropping qualities of the one Mears built in -30C and slept in without a sleeping bag, but it’s not bad. If we can manage to get a fire going, it might yet be the kind of place an estate agent would describe as cosy, but in need of modernisation.

This time Mark does give us a few pointers. The trick is to dig down about two inches and lay a base of twigs on the bottom to keep the fire away from the soil. He also tells us how to build a simple reflector, which will ensure the heat from the fire is directed back into the shelter. Like most things in the survival business, it sounds easier than it actually is.

For a start, we have collected the wrong colour twigs for kindling and despite Mark’s best efforts to be encouraging, the reflector is all wrong and we need to start again. It doesn’t take long and with a little papery bark stripped from a birch tree and the use of Mark’s flint – fire starting equipment is another thing we need to put on our must-buy list – we’re in business.

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For a while we just sit. There’s something oddly mesmerising about watching a real fire. We could have probably stayed there some time had it not started to hail, which is when we realised that while our open-fronted shelter had an appealing asymmetrical quality to it, it could also double as a wind tunnel.

In most property programmes, this is the point where the original project manager is sacked and a new one brought in at great expense. In Dalby Forest, we simply collect some more branches and build ourselves a windbreak. After a week in the office, there’s something immediately attractive about spending some time in a place where there’s no mobile phone signal and the only thing we have to worry about is what’s for dinner and whether our shelter will remain standing until morning.

Back at the main camp fire, the pheasants intended for the evening stew are hanging on trees waiting to be prepared. There’s one for each of us to have a go at and if successful we’ll be able to add “pheasant plucker” to our CV. In truth it’s a fairly straightforward business and the final stew, cooked on the open fire, is simple, decent and it’s impossible not to want seconds.

After dinner Mark guides us on a short walk around the forest. The day trippers have gone home and it’s generally the time when the wildlife starts to make an appearance. Some deer, who it turns out bark like dogs during the night, have been spotted just a short walk from where we are camped. When we get there they have already ducked for cover.

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By the time we get back to the camp we have seen a total or two bats and one rabbit. The lack of nocturnal activity makes the walk less interesting, but might make us sleep more soundly. Sitting round the main camp fire as dusk turns to night, Mark says at this point he would normally get out his banjo. Unfortunately, he broke a finger erecting a tepee, so there’ll be no soundtrack from Deliverance. When you’re about to spend a night in the company of complete strangers, one of whom has a passion for knife-making, I can’t help but feel relieved.

However, a night like this doesn’t need music. These days, when lighting fires in most forest is illegal and the building of dens is positively discouraged, just being here is enough. The course at Dalby Forest was set up as an antidote to the way most of us live and it seems we have done better than one man who built his shelter only to find he couldn’t actually fit in it. There was another on his way to the Lake District who arrived without either a sleeping bag or much clue about the outdoors. He built what Mark describes as the worst shelter he has ever seen.

“I never did hear how he got on,” he says. “He might well still be in Cumbria somewhere.”

It’s shortly before midnight when I slip into my sleeping bag – not as easy as it sounds when your movements are restricted by five layers of clothing. We debate building up the fire before we close our eyes, but when you’re about to bed down in a house of twigs, I can’t help but feels it’s like leaving hair straighteners on next to a can of hair spray and snuggling up in a flammable duvet.

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In the end we put it out and prepare to wake up shivering at dawn. It’s 8.30am when we finally stir. The farrier has already packed up and the man and his knives are nowhere to be seen. Our final task is to reduce our shelter to the twigs and leaves from which it came - apparently if we leave it standing some of Dalby’s wildlife might start a commune. What took hours to build disappears in a minute. We take one of the supporting branches home as a souvenir. The shelter may be gone, but our night in the forest won’t be forgotten.

* The next Bushcraft for Beginners course at Dalby Forest will take place on September 17. For further details call 01751 472771.