Monday, March 23, 2015

Winter Camping -Hilary Alexander


Winter camping was a great time and the night went very well. However, there were things that went very well and other things I would like to improve in the future.

One thing I thought I thought I did well was preparation of food with my group. We organized a shopping list and had plenty of food for the night therefore it was a very pleasant night and no one was hungry. Going into the night I was worried we might not have enough to eat but we ended up having plenty of food and I was very content.
Secondly our cold sink was built very well so that we could block the hole with our bags and then were able to stay warm throughout the night. Our tunnel was built in such a way so that it dropped after the platform creating a great cold skin to trap the cold air. This made the quinzhee very comfortable to sleep in.
Lastly something I did well was bringing proper sleeping gear. I had a -7 sleeping bag layered with a blanket, wore a long sleeve dry fit shirt with a hoodie on top and layered leggings with sweat pants. This worked very well because I had a very good sleep and was warm all night and even waking up I stayed warm and was very satisfied with my sleeping gear.
Something that I would improve on would be the length of our tunnel; next time if we were to build a quinzhee again I would make the tunnel of our quinzhee much shorter. Most of the night trying to crawl into or out of the quinzhee it was difficult and time-consuming trying to wiggle in or out of the quinzhee.
Secondly in the future I would improve my winter camp experience by instead of building our quinzhee in just a group of four to instead work with a group sleeping another night. This would double the amount of people working on our quinzhee and would have made the construction of our quinzhee quicker.
The first tip I would give to someone winter camping and building a quinzhee would be to bring lots of clothing to change into. If your clothes get wet it will be nearly impossible for you to stay warm, therefore the more clothes and layers you can bring would be most beneficial.
Secondly it is very important that you have a proper sleeping bag, layer if you need to, because you will not get a good night sleep if you are waking up throughout the night because you’re freezing. A winter sleeping bag will be necessary in order to stay warm throughout the night.
Lastly I would recommend to make sure you block the tunnel/entrance of your quinzhee overnight because that will be a huge factor in staying warm and making the night a success. This will reinforce your cold ink by not letting very much wind and cold air in, in the first place.   

Overall I had a very enjoyable time winter camping and hope to be able to do it again.

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