When my son was in air cadets they overnighted in shelters they made with a knife, paracord , cut fern fronds and it turned out to be frosty and damp , At home I was so worried for him , and he got back home and said it was great . I will have to ask him if he had a sleeping bag . T'is a far nicer time of year now .

Keep it small, keep it insulated and get over the insects running across your face all night.

Preppersaurus

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eS8N2E7zYs

this would be my suggestion, nothing fancy, simple to put up and take down. Enjoy your trek.

hey Aaron, how was your trek into the wildness?? what kind of shelter did you end out building??

Hey George. It was awesome, might be doing it again next weekend. I built a very crude shelter and it's a real good thing it didn't rain that night lol My first problem is I didnt leave myself enough time before dark to build it. I built mine within about an hour or less? You should leave yourself up to two hours especially if you're inexpierienced like myself. The second major problem is I chose a location where other people camp in the back country, and the majority of branches and debris were gone, used for firewood. So that was another problem.
But I managed to find a small fallen over tree, and used it as the "spine" of my shelter. I used a small tarp (was actually a tube tent that I now consider useless, and will never waste my money on such a thing again) as the floor, after I piled a bunch of ferns under it for comfort first. Then I used my other tarp and tied it to the spine, and placed it to the ground at an angle. Weighed it down with some rocks. Then for the other side I set up ribs at an angle with whatever sticks I could find, then piled as many live ferns over it as I could find before dark. It as alright for the night but like I said if it rained, I might have been in trouble. Will try to make a better one next weekend.
A couple other things I learned during my outing was that flashlights? Im getting rid of mine and replacing it with a headlamp. My flashlight was a good one, but the problem is I only have one available hand when I use it. It's amazing how much of a hassle that can be! Lastly, I decided to order a folding saw. One of my buddies had a small saw with him and it proved to be invaluable.

You know, sometimes we talk about what skills people have. And at some of the meetings hosted from this forum I hear people who are meeting others for the first time saying things like "What do you do for a living? Oh yeah! Thats a useful transferable skill eh?!?!" And I realized after this trip, that thats actually kind of a silly question/statement to be making. Why? Because my 11 year old son was shown once how to use the saw, afterwards he spent the next hour or so cutting apart the majority of a tree. This kid has never had a job, is no carpenter, concrete worker, pipefitter, electrician, or anything. Yet he provided us with firewood, and proved that he has more useful skill than a lot of working adults do. It's all about basics people. |It doesnt matter what you know now. It only matters what you can use in this type of situation. EVERYBODY has a use, I dont care what your age or physical condition is or what kind of expierience you have/had. It only matters what you can put into practical use. That was the main purpose of this trek, that and to find out hat tools in your BOB are worth having and what ones should be discarded. Again, headlamp and saw INVALUABLE.

🙂

sounds like you had fun!!! yah a headlamp will work much better, free up both hands. Like you, i learned the hard way in the bush that headlamps are much better. but if you were able to get something built in about an hour then i suppose that isn't too bad considering the situation. I like the way you did all this stuff, because you didnt give yourself all day to build your shelter( one day you may not have... all day!!!) you used the bare minimum and by the sounds of it, made it work. Which im guessing was the whole point of the trek. IM guessing you took your bug out bag on this one?? how was the weight? meals...MRE's?? or did you rock the emergency stove from cogleans??
Folding saws are a good way to go for sure and good ones can be had most places( canadian tire etc) I agree with you that everybody has a use, you find out really fast what a person can do when it's crunch time. And like you said, everybody can do something. Glad to hear you had a good trip, enjoy the next one....with a headlamp of course.....

Took the bug out bag, weighing roughly 45 pounds. ate MRE's, which turned out to be pretty gross! Decided Im going to start making my own organic MRE's, haha. I rocked the little pop can stove preppersaurus taught me to make:) Was a great trip. Plan to do this several more times throughout the summer for sure.

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Hats with the built in led lights work well as a headlamp/flashlight back up.