Camping on crown land

This is interesting.  I was viewing some YouTube videos when all of a sudden, I thought, "what about crown lands?"  There is a lot of crown land in Ontario and they are not maintained by anybody.  Crown land is pretty much what nature is supposed to be.  Camping on crown land, except for some special places, is completely free.  I am now thinking of finding these crown lands instead of going to those maintained campgrounds.

My next trip is probably going to be to Big Orillia Lake.

I found the following links very useful:

Crown Land discussion

Crown Land Use Policy Atlas in Ontario

Camping with a hammock

This fall, I am thinking of going tent-less.  Just bring in a hammock and a tarp over my head.

I have a Amazonas Travel Hammock that weighs next to nothing.  The hammock is made out of nylon capable of supporting 250lbs.  I had used it a couple of nights because I forgot to load my tent into the canoe once.  Stupid me but that was a nice experience.  It was a nice experience but I have to say it was hard to sleep at first--I kept on sliding to one side of the hammock as my body weight caused the strings to shift, and there were there mosquitoes.

Well, I will give it another try.  This time around, I think I know how I will sleep in it, and I will also buy a mosquito net that spans the length of the hammock.  I am also thinking I will have my DIY stove near my hammock to provide me some warmth.  In addition to that, I will bring my foam mat to provide some insulation for my back.

The more I think about it, the more I want to be out there.  It will be interesting.

InstaFire

Has anyone tried this product?  A friend of mine found it at Costco's.  I believe they were selling a box of 24 bags for $37.  I took half of the box and my friend took the other half.

Tonight, as I was trying out my poor man's wood stove, I thought I'd try InstaFire as a fire starter.  The bag suggests to pour out about 1/4 to 1/2 of the bag to use as fire starter.  However, if you have your kindling ready, you just need a spoonful of InstaFire to get things going.  That is what I did tonight--one spoonful.

I lit up the InstaFire spoonful with my Bear Grylls' ferrocerium rod.  After four strikes, the sparks landed on a small lump of InstaFire.  The lump began to burn immediately.  I dumped the lump of InstaFire into my wood stove with my kindling already piled up inside.  The kindling started to light up within seconds.

I sealed the opened bag of InstaFire in a Ziplock bag and will leave it in my wood stove.  I think I can use InstaFire as a fire starter for at least six camping trips.

Wood stove, part 3

Well, I did the test today with the new holes at the top of the stove.  Those holes are not big enough.  As soon as I place a pot over the entire surface of the inner can, the fire gets choked up.  I think I need a cross grill placed over the inner can.

Wood stove, part 2

Well, I ran my test this past weekend at the Cyprus Lake national park.  It worked extremely well.  I thought the outer can would be warm or cool to the touch.  Man, was I wrong!  It was super hot!  Once lit up, I could clearly see jet flames coming out of the upper holes in the inner can.  The whole thing worked so well that all the wood I placed inside the wood burned into ash within 10 minutes.  I think that would be long enough to boil maybe a litre of water.

Now, a small alteration to the inner can ... I have just made a bunch of holes at the top of the inner can.  This way, I can place a pot directly on top of the inner can and air can still escape from the inner can.

The aluminum hollow disc at the bottom of the picture below is used to cover the space between the inner and outer cans.