4 replies to this topic

[Shane V]

In some parts of Tasmania there is a lot of rainfall and finding dry wood for your campfire is difficult. Here's a little tip to make finding dry wood.

Look under thick shrubbery, rain doesn't always get through to the ground there. You can usually find small pieces, twigs and such. Gather as much as you can of the small stuff and you can start your fire with that. Add thicker pieces of wood gradually, it is best if you get the thicker wood also from unde the shrubs.

You should find it pretty easy to get pieces up to an inch thick burning. By this time you can start to add larger pieces of wet wood. Don't be totally stupid and throw half a tree on it, use your brains and gradually increase the thickness of the wood that you add.

We lit many fires after it had been raining all night and a couple of days beforehand. It will take a bit to get going and there may be smoke,wet wood does that, but it will burn.

If you have any doubt, look at the picture below. It had snowed all night the night before and had been raining for two days before. This fire was lit just after sunrise, using the method described above.

[Ned Kelly]

Another good tip is to use a short candle stub and teepee your twigs over it to start a fire with wet wood. I have started campfires in the rain using this technique. (Up here in Queensland where we sometimes get rain)

[Mystic]

Good tip Ned, thanks.

We had a couple of Queenslanders spend a week here on the west coast with us last year. None of their friends back home believed them about how much rain we got, so they spent a lot of time taking photo's of rain to prove it.

[Ned Kelly]

As long as it doesn't rain too much in November. We are coming down for the month and touring round in a van. Hope to do plenty of walks, catch up with friends and generally de-stress. Last time we were down was 2006 and we had 2 weeks and only 2 days of rain so I think we should be OK.

[Shane V]

You have certainly picked the right time to come down, the dry season for the west coast at least. Maybe we could meet up????