Frugal Camping Tips ( mostly for tent camping)

[ajrsmom]

Printed from Thriftyfun News



A lot of these tips are for tent camping. They are inspired by
some hints from an old Boy Scout site.

1. Channel lock pliers make good pot holders for cooling on a
camp stove or over a fire.

2. Canning rings can be use to cook your eggs in for egg
sandwiches. (Works well for English Muffins or Hamburger buns).

3. Plastic butter tubs make good storage containers for your camp
kitchen.

4. A plastic bottle makes a good latrine for cold weather
camping. Keep it just outside the tent flap.

5. Old shower curtains and old plastic covered tablecloths make
great ground cloths.

6. Waterproof matches by dipping in melted paraffin, nail polish
or shellac.

7. Make fire starters by filling paper condiment cups with saw
dust and pouring paraffin into the cup.

8. Put matches in corrugated cardboard strips (about every other
hole) and dip into paraffin for fire starters. Cut off what you
need to start a fire.

9. Make a double boiler for melting paraffin from a 1 lb. coffee
can and a 2 lb. coffee can. Pour some water in the 2 lb. can and
put the paraffin in the 1 lb. can. Bend a coat hanger so it will
support the 1 lb. coffee can off the bottom of the 2 lb. can.

10. A length of chain and a piece of coat hanger bent into an
S-shape will allow you to hang your lantern from a tree limb.

11. Keep batteries in an appropriate size prescription bottle to
insure that they cannot run themselves down by accident. Bring a
nail file or emery board to clean the connections. This can
extend battery life.

12. Prescription bottles make good match safes.

13. Prescription bottles or 35mm file containers make good
storage places for small items.

14. Grills from old ovens or barbecues can be used for fire
grills. Don't use refrigerator shelves as they will release
toxic gasses when heated.

15. A frisbee will add support to paper plates when the plate is
place inside the frisbee.

16. Make a camp washing machine from a five gallon bucket and a
toilet plunger.

17. Cutting slivers off scrap lumber and heating in the oven to
dry out the wood will produce some very dry tinder. Remember to
store in plastic bags for your next trip. Save candle stubs for
fire starters or to use as paraffin to make other fire starters.

18. Insulate your backpacking stove from the ground in cold
weather with a 6" X 6" piece of plywood.

19. Cover the ice in a picnic cooler with foil to help it last
longer. Keep water in your canteen cooler by wrapping the canteen
in foil.

20. When handling evergreens or pine cones, they can remove the
sticky sap from their hands easily if they use baking soda
instead of soap to wash.

21. To prevent batteries from wearing down if a flashlight is
accidently nudged on while you're traveling, put the flashlight
batteries in backwards.

22. An empty plastic soda bottle, cut off to a convenient height,
will work as a camp bowl. You may want to sandpaper the cut to
smooth the edge.

23. To conserve rope, mark each length of rope with a distinctive
color and make a rule that the rope is never cut.

24. Wrap a wet washcloth in a foil package and put it into your
pack. You'll have a handy 'wet-wipe' for cleaning hands and face
after a satisfying camp meal.

25. Foil provides good packaging material for a campers personal
toilet articles.

Source: The original file for these low-cost
equipment/ideas/fixes for Scouting and camping in general was
originally found on a F-Net Scouting board and was reposted on
Fidonet on Nov 11/92 by Steve Simmons. The file evidently
originated with BSA Troop 886 in the USA.

[beckie]

These are great, I just copied and pasted and mailed to the scouts in my address book, thanks!

Be blessed,
beckie


another one is an old knee high hose with soap in it, tied to the wash area for washing hands....

[Irish Angel]

Tami thanks alot.
Becki when I was a GS leader we used the panty hose idea.

We also used bleach in the rinse water to help disinfect. Not alot just a tad.

For water to wash hands we hung a milk jug and plugged a hole with a golf tee. You took the T out to get water to wash your hands and then quickly plugged it again.

We also had a garbage bag with quite a few leaves in the bottom to catch the water and such where we emptied food, ran dish water through and where we emptied our mouths when rinsing our teeth.

35 MM canisters also make good salt, pepper and spice shakers

Have you ever heard of JUNGLE BREAKFAST? My 15 year old still loves that. You place various different breakfast foods in brown sacks and hang them in the trees. The bag you pick is yours. You can make the bags different with various fruits or cereal brands.

[beckie]

I have not had the jungle breakfast, but, my daughter has, I believe. She just joined girl scouts this year, and I have only gone camping with them once. THey are certainly adventurous girls, no sitting around for them. They were repelling ropes last time when I went!

I love the kids being in scouts, and we love to camp, so, a good combo. I love all of these camping ideas, too...We used some of them when we went family camping.

Be blessed,
beckie

I had heard of the golf tee and milk jug idea, just have not used it. Never heard of the trash bag, sounds like a great idea.

[Irish Angel]

good morning

the newspaper sit-upons are great too and fun to make~

[beckie]

DD's troop leader mentioned 'sit upons' and showed me a swap with some mini ones on it, and a troop gave her a big one. How do you make them with newspaper?