Survivorman- Canadas Boreal Forest
Winter is only weeks away when the Survivorman crew leaves host Les Stroud soaking wet and stranded by the side of a river in northern Canada’s boreal forest. With a single match, a knife, a bit of jerky, and a handful of cashews, Stroud must find his way back to civilization or a rescue crew will be sent out to find him.
This time of year is dominated by rain and snow flurries almost constantly, so in order to make it through the night, his first priority is to light a fire. Stroud spends the remaining few hours of daylight gathering firewood for the night. When you think you have enough wood to last the night, Stroud says, gather five times more to be safe.
Stroud uses an interesting technique to stay warm this first night without a shelter. While he’s gathering firewood, he heats large slabs of rock on the fire. When he’s ready for sleep, he rolls the rocks out of the flames and uses them as heated bedding. By the morning the rocks still haven’t lost all their heat.
Aside from the weather, the greatest danger for a lost traveler in the boreal forest this time of year is the bull moose. Up to six feet tall and over 1,000 pounds, bull moose at running season are particularly vicious. Bear also inhabit this forest so Stroud marks his campsite with urine, hoping this will keep them away.
Building a shelter to keep the rain off is another vital task. Using dry timber and spruce boughs, Stroud builds a tent-like shelter. The going is quite slow (as is collecting firewood) due to lack of an axe- a tool Stroud says is as crucial for survival in the forest as a machete is in the jungle.
The rain pours so hard that Stroud doesn’t leave the shelter for several days, even to film.
After his figure-four small mammal trap fails (the animal took his cashews without setting off the trap), Stroud collects a few snails and some water lily tubers. Wading into a lake barely above freezing temperature, Stroud collects the root tubers of the lily. He tries to eat them raw but they are so bitter he is forced to boil them: using his hat as the water pot and hot rocks from the fire to boil the water, the tubers slowly cook. The taste is still repulsive but he forces it down for the calories. Unfortunately, the tubers were so disagreeable he vomits. The shell-less snails he eats just fine, wishing he had some garlic butter to go with them.
When the rain lightens up, Stroud begins the long trek east, where he is certain there is a highway. On the way, he encounters many lakes that he must walk around, adding miles and miles to his journey.
At one point, the forest becomes so thick around him he says it feels like it is closing in on him, and he becomes disoriented. He uses the moss growing on trees to point him in the right direction- moss sometimes grows all the way around the trunk, but when it’s just growing on one side, that side signals the north.
Stroud spends several nights beside lakes, and this is the first time he voices fears over being alone in the forest. A fire, he says, does provide needed warmth, but equally important, it also makes the dark forest less spooky.
Dressing in layers is essential, Stroud says. Temperatures are below freezing at night, but it is easy to work up a sweat traveling during the day. Sweating is to be avoided at all costs, he says, because once you and your clothes get damp, the cold weather will freeze it and make you miserable and more susceptible to hypothermia.
Stroud must wade across numerous streams, mostly half-naked, carrying his shoes, socks, and pants across so as to not get them wet. Repeating this process often, combined with the need to take two trips for his camera gear, lowers his core body temperature. Hypothermia becomes more of a risk as he gets more desperate and careless toward the end and begins wading through icy streams with his pants on.
An exciting discovery Stroud comes across is railroad tracks running north and south. Railroad tracks have the potential to be a savior for a lost traveler with no sense of direction (although they could lead you hundreds of miles away from, rather than to, civilization), but since Stroud is positive the highway is east, he continues to follow his instincts.
Stroud also comes across a hydro-line, which he says can also potentially give a lost traveler some direction, but again, hydro-lines can go for hundreds of miles without leading to civilization.
On the seventh day, Stroud hears running water in the distance. It turns out to be the highway. All Stroud must do now is wait for a car to pick up the weary hitchhiker so he can leave behind the forest just in time- by next week, it will be frozen over for winter.
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