Everything For The Outdoors!

A pocketknife is also known as folding knife. Its important feature is the blade that slides into the handle. This knife is small enough that it fits in a pocket. Normally the length of a blade ranges from 3-5 inches. A pocket knife can be very useful in many tasks such as opening an envelope or cutting cord or slicing a fruit.

There are few types of pocket knives and among them Swiss Army Knife is very popular. The other types are pen knife, quill pen, whittler, stockman, trapper, sodbuster and credit card knife. Also there are some popular styles of blade shapes namely; clip, spear, drop point, pen, sheep’s foot, wharncliffe, spay (spey) and hook. The invention of locking knives changed the knife world forever. However, there is some certain amount of restrictions on the use of pocket knives in many countries.

The uses of a pocket knife can be divided into three categories namely, frequent uses, occasional uses and potential uses. Some common functions that a pocket knife can perform are; peeling, cutting, repairing, chamfering, scraping, extracting, modifying, digging and field dressing etc.

During our first camping trip, my boyfriend continually teased me about the presence of bears.  While hiking he pointed out bear scat, as well as claw scrapes on a tree and paw prints in the mud.  I laughed off his observations and firmly held onto the belief that he was wrong.

We returned to the campsite site at dusk to cook a nice steak dinner on the grill. Looking up, I was shocked to see a large bear lumbering towards us and whispered urgently, “Honey, there’s a bear”.  With the day’s previous joking in mind, he chuckled and said “Oh yeah, where?”.  I nodded my head behind him, and he turned around to discover a black bear standing not 10 feet away from us.

He picked up the flashlight and chased off the bear by yelling at it to go away.  We quickly finished up with dinner, and then I nearly hurled myself into the tent.  Pulling down the zipper securely, I announced that finally we were safe from the bear.  My boyfriend didn’t have the heart to tell me that a few microns of nylon were not about to keep a determined bear out of the tent.  But luckily we had taken all of the right precautions such as hanging our food from a branch, so we had no unexpected visitors that night.

Once it happened that I and my family decided to go for a camp. We found a very good location which was very beautiful and exotic hence we decided to spend few nights there. We started to build our camping tent. Once the tent was built it grew dark and we all lit a camp fire to keep the surrounding warm. Suddenly we heard a noise coming form the woods we where all scared and hence we all remained inside our tent to protect ourselves. We where expecting some wild animal coming towards our tent.

Not knowing what to do, we all waited for the danger to approach. We had nothing to defend ourselves hence we took our only weapon we had with us which where a few knives. Crouching inside the tent with our knives we waited to see a huge outrageous bear heading towards our tent. Not knowing what to do, for self defense we all threw our knife towards the bear. Two of the knife hit the bear on his hand and leg. The bear out of pain simply ran towards the opposite direction. After the incidence we where all very relieved. We where very lucky and had escaped death and where very thankful that we had a knife to defend us.

Every savvy camper knows the supplies you pack can either make or break the trip.  There are certain items that must be included in your overnight bag to make the trip fun and comfortable.  The basic supplies include the tent (if your campsite does not include a shelter or cabin.) An air mattress or sleeping bag is also essential.  If using a sleeping bag, you may want to consider a pad for underneath. Large plastic containers are important for storing food, as this keeps your food dry and prevents animals, such as raccoons from scavenging.

Other must have’s include hygiene items such as soap, shampoo and deodorant.  Your camping buddies will not want to sleep in the same campsite as you if you forget these items.  Hand sanitizer, if you will be fishing or hunting is good to have on hand.  Paper towels, napkins and even moist towelettes are useful since you will likely be making smores over the camp fire.  You definitely don’t want to over pack, but having the essential items will make the trip less stressful.

Buying the right camping gear is a difficult job if one doesn’t have any previous experience. Firstly, one must be sure of the camping gear that is needed for the kind of trip planned. It is a great idea to consult someone, a friend or a professional who has done the adventures before. Once the list for the essential equipment is ready, one should realize that half the work is done. Internet is a great source for choosing and buying not only the camping gear but any thing of ones interests is easily available on internet.

There are many camping outlet stores available all across the globe, where one can easily find the equipment of choice. As it is rightly said that good preparations leads to good adventures, one should not compromise on the durability of the equipment that has to be used during the trip. Especially the tents and back packs should be water resistant and also resistive to bad weather conditions. The flash lights should also be water resistant and their batteries should be fully charged before the trip. Putting extra batteries and backpack in the camping gear is always a very wise decision. Hence, it would not be wrong to state that the adventure of the trip lies in the durability of camping gear and the preparation and planning of the trip.

A tent is the most important part of your camping gear. You can have a entire truck load of gear but if have no tent, a bad tent or the wrong tent all of your other camping equipment becomes useless. You can get by without an axe by using more kindling and burning larger bits of wood. A camping stove is a great convenience but you can always cook on the fire. A tent however is essential.

How do you pick a tent? Its really not that hard despite the large array of choices. You should get the best tent you can afford and buy one that is slightly bigger than you think you will need. If you have four adults on your trip and gear you should look to buy an eight person tent. A four person tent will contain four adults but not comfortably and not necessarily with enough room for all the supplies you bring and need to keep safe or dry. After this its just a matter of choosing the right shape, height, and area. Remember not to buy too big because you may have trouble finding a flat spot to lay your tent out. Always remember that the tent is the most  important part of your camping equipment.