How Do We Build a Campfire?

Campfire Safety and Enjoyment: The Joy and Responsibility of Campfires in Camping

Episode Highlights:

1. Passion for Campfires:
   • Pamela and Tim share their love for the quintessential camping experience of evening campfires, emphasizing the joy and warmth they bring to outdoor adventures.
2. Fire Safety Essentials:
   • Location Selection: Always choose a safe spot for your fire, preferably using a designated fire ring to prevent uncontrolled spread.
   • Wind Protection: Be mindful of wind direction and strength to avoid accidents and underground fires.
   • Extinguishing Preparedness: Keep a bucket of water nearby to extinguish the fire when necessary swiftly.
3. Leave No Trace Principle:
   • Avoiding Half-Burnt Logs: Ensure all logs are fully burned to prevent littering.
   • No Plastics: Do not burn plastics to maintain environmental integrity and avoid attracting wildlife to human food.
4. Fire-Building Tips:
   • Materials: Use natural materials like newspaper, peat moss, pine needles, birch bark, and dry leaves for efficient fire starting.
   • Structures: The teepee and log cabin methods are discussed, with a preference for the stability of the log cabin structure.
   • Ignition Tools: Waterproof matches and lighters are recommended for ease of use.
5. Regulations and Environmental Impact:
   • Adhering to Regulations: Always follow local fire regulations and avoid making fires during bans.
   • Seasoned Firewood: Use appropriate materials like seasoned firewood to minimize environmental harm.
6. Final Safety Reminders:
   • Complete Extinguishment: Ensure the fire is fully out and no embers are left smoldering before leaving the site.

Pamela and Tim underscore the blend of enjoyment and responsibility that comes with campfires, urging campers to cherish these moments while prioritizing safety and environmental care. Tune in for detailed insights and personal anecdotes that bring these guidelines to life!

Transcript

00:00 - 00:04
Hello and good day, eh? Welcome to the Super Good Camping podcast. My name is Pamela.

00:04 - 00:05
I'm Tim. And we

00:05 - 00:10
are from supergoodcamping.com. We are here because we're on a mission to inspire other families

00:10 - 00:13
to enjoy camping adventures such as we have with our kids.

00:13 - 00:17
And one of our very favorite aspects of camping is the evening campfire.

00:18 - 00:24
We just love sitting around, sitting around sharing stories, sitting around just eating snacks

00:24 - 00:27
like s'mores and hot dogs and roasted over the fire.

00:28 - 00:30
But it's one of our very favorite parts of camping.

00:30 - 00:34
So we're gonna talk today about how to build the ultimate campfire.

00:34 - 00:38
Okay. So the first thing you wanna do is you wanna choose the right location. Right?

00:39 - 00:41
It wants to be an open area.

00:41 - 00:46
You don't want, you know, trees hanging over over top like branches and dry grass, all that sort of jazz.

00:47 - 00:51
You don't want any anything flammable around it because you're about to make fire.

00:51 - 00:53
So not close to your tent.

00:53 - 00:55
So Spartacus can set that up, Lacey.

00:55 - 00:57
Sorry. I don't mean to laugh.

00:57 - 01:01
That should be a given, but there are people who haven't haven't made a campfire before, so

01:01 - 01:03
that's a good point, sweetie. Yeah.

01:03 - 01:08
You you also ideally, you wanna protect yourself from, wants to be protected from winds.

01:08 - 01:15
If you're Ontario parks, they have a, like, a designated campfire, like a ring that that your campfire goes in.

01:16 - 01:18
You can if you're in the backcountry, make your own.

01:18 - 01:23
If there isn't one set up already, you can use some rocks to set up a ring to put the fire just

01:23 - 01:25
try to contain it a little bit.

01:25 - 01:30
You're looking for also not lots of, like, dry, flammable twigs and leaves and things like that

01:30 - 01:33
right around where you're putting your campfire because it can spread.

01:33 - 01:38
Yeah. And, you know, if you've got exposed roots, well, even if you they're not exposed, it still has potential.

01:38 - 01:42
We'll get to we'll get to making sure that nothing nothing else burns, but if you've got exposed

01:42 - 01:45
roots, you can set those on fire if it's in your fire pit.

01:45 - 01:51
And then it will burn underground, and you won't know it until 3 days later, a fire sprits up,

01:51 - 02:01
and we're into wildfire, which is poopy, especially after this past this past wild fire season. My goodness. Okay. So safety.

02:01 - 02:04
So very first thing is have a bucket of water.

02:04 - 02:06
Doesn't I don't care what you choose to use.

02:07 - 02:13
We use our largest when Thomas and I are in the backcountry, we use our largest, cooking pot

02:13 - 02:19
and we use the dishwashing bag so that we've got 2 rounds of of water to put it out or or at

02:19 - 02:22
least get it going in that direction and then perhaps go get some more water afterwards.

02:23 - 02:26
In the front country, you can use I don't I don't care.

02:26 - 02:28
You can actually use a bucket, whatever.

02:29 - 02:32
You want it needs to be there if anything jumps out of the pit.

02:34 - 02:38
And at the end of the night when you want to put it out, it needs to get put out. I'm just saying.

02:38 - 02:42
When you think you've had it wet it down enough, you haven't. Do another

02:42 - 02:43
Wet it down again.

02:43 - 02:45
Wet it down again. Well, I well, wait. You know what?

02:45 - 02:48
We'll talk about a couple other things too. Leave no trace. Right?

02:48 - 02:54
The the idea is, like, don't don't burn a a thing in the fire pit, you know, and then go, oh, I'm tired.

02:54 - 02:56
I don't I don't want to finish burning it.

02:56 - 03:01
And then you've got a a log that's half burnt because it was you'll see it at some point.

03:01 - 03:04
Some bonehead will put a a log in that's 4 feet long.

03:05 - 03:08
The fire pit's not 4 feet long, so a bunch of it's hanging out.

03:08 - 03:10
Don't don't be that guy. Leave no trace. Okay?

03:10 - 03:13
Oh, and garbage. Don't throw the garbage in the fire.

03:13 - 03:15
Don't don't do that. Don't do that stuff. Look.

03:15 - 03:20
When I was younger, I I thought when we were backcountry, you know, you you vacuum bag your

03:20 - 03:26
food and stuff, and then you burn that plastic. Nope. I don't.

03:26 - 03:27
I pack it out now. Now.

03:27 - 03:32
Again, we're we're tree huggers. It's bad. It's it's polluting.

03:33 - 03:35
There will be something left behind.

03:35 - 03:41
Somebody will throw some inevitably throw something in with tinfoil or a a wrapper that has

03:41 - 03:46
the mylar on the inside. It won't all burn. Don't do those things.

03:46 - 03:48
And then you've left a trace.

03:48 - 03:49
Yes. You've left a trace. It's bad.

03:49 - 03:50
And and you know what?

03:50 - 03:55
You're gonna habituate animals of some type because they then they know to come to the fire

03:55 - 03:59
because that's where there's might be some tasty morsels left over, etcetera, etcetera.

03:59 - 04:05
So now that you've been admonished and you you can hear me wag my finger at you, let's get into,

04:05 - 04:07
let's get into actually building a fire.

04:07 - 04:12
So the you've we we've got a good condition good, good location for it, you know, not not too

04:12 - 04:18
windy, not near anything else that's gonna go up in flames, etcetera, etcetera. Fire starter.

04:18 - 04:24
So, again, it depends on where you are and and how picky you are about what you wanna do.

04:24 - 04:30
I I have no issues with carrying a bit of newspaper around with me, or, you know, a Firestar

04:30 - 04:38
like, we've this previous summer, Thomas and I did, had some Mi'kwik Firestarters that we got

04:38 - 04:46
from, the coolest kids in Michigan, the cool cool quest, and, we gave them a shot.

04:46 - 04:50
They're, you know, they're they're they're not all full of chemicals. Like, it's all natural.

04:51 - 04:57
Burns for a long time, so you kinda can't screw up. They weigh nothing. It's pretty easy stuff.

04:57 - 05:00
I threw it in, threw some newspaper in, and poof, had a fire. Nope. And I

05:00 - 05:03
think you said it was, like, damp wood or something that day.

05:03 - 05:07
We it had rain for 2 days, so we didn't find we didn't find, like, green wood.

05:07 - 05:12
We found well cured wood, but there was nothing that was that was dry per se.

05:12 - 05:13
So, yeah, it was a

05:13 - 05:14
And it made it go.

05:14 - 05:15
And it made it go.

05:15 - 05:23
But you know, newspaper, you know, you can you can get little bits of peat moss if you wanna do bushcraft.

05:23 - 05:28
Nice dry peat moss, some some pine needles. Birch bark. Birch bark.

05:28 - 05:30
Birch bark is an excellent one.

05:30 - 05:32
Don't take it off a live tree, please. No.

05:32 - 05:34
Pick it off a a branch that's on the ground.

05:35 - 05:41
You can shave bits of wood to get to get smaller, you know, lighter stuff that's gonna catch easier.

05:41 - 05:43
And then and then you work your way up from there.

05:43 - 05:48
You know, you get teeny tiny branches that that, you know, the very end of a branch.

05:48 - 05:50
Snap those off and make sure they're nice and dry.

05:51 - 05:56
They wanna go on next, and then you progressively work it up to a pencil size, etcetera, etcetera.

05:56 - 06:02
And, we carry you could you by all means, you can sit there and strike away at your flint if

06:02 - 06:05
you've got super super light nice dry stuff.

06:05 - 06:09
I I don't feel a need to do it. I have a lighter.

06:09 - 06:14
I have usually carry a lighter and then I carry at least a couple of boxes of waterproof matches

06:14 - 06:17
because it invariably, they're in a pocket when you get wet or whatever.

06:18 - 06:21
So that's what we do. Yeah. You know what? Oh, leaves.

06:21 - 06:22
That's another good one too.

06:22 - 06:25
If you're especially if it's fall time, you know, you if you've got nice dry leaves, they work

06:25 - 06:30
well as in that sort of birch bark, way to go.

06:30 - 06:33
And then you just, yeah, you keep working your way up to bigger and bigger sticks.

06:34 - 06:37
Then there's really, there are multiple.

06:37 - 06:38
You can just throw wood in.

06:39 - 06:41
It won't light all that well. It'll be a pain.

06:41 - 06:43
You'll be blowing on it constantly, etcetera etcetera.

06:44 - 06:47
There there's really 2 types of of, campfire to make.

06:47 - 06:52
You can do the teepee and you can also do, like a log cabin.

06:52 - 06:55
I'm a log cabin guide, but I'll still tell you how to do a TP.

06:55 - 06:57
But largely because they collapse on me.

06:57 - 07:03
It's just, it's not, I, maybe because I suck at it and I'm better at a log cabin and I think log cabins are easier.

07:03 - 07:06
Anyhow, TP is exactly what you picture.

07:07 - 07:13
They're they're sticks, they're, you're you're pointing them sort of upwards to a center point

07:13 - 07:15
and you're leaning them against each other.

07:16 - 07:28
Don't, you know, you wanna start with maybe a slightly smaller sticks and then do, not a additional, ring of larger ones.

07:28 - 07:33
Leave yourself a gap so you can get in and light your tinder on the inside, and then and then

07:33 - 07:36
we'll largely sit back and and wait to see what happens.

07:36 - 07:37
See if it if it takes.

07:37 - 07:45
If it doesn't, you can you can blow, which adds oxygen to the fire and make it go, but it will

07:45 - 07:47
fall down at some point.

07:47 - 07:51
So log cabin, that's my guy.

07:51 - 07:56
To so you put your tinder and stuff in the middle on on, say, either side of it, left or right.

07:56 - 08:05
You put 2 sticks roughly the same size, and then front and back on top of those sticks, like

08:05 - 08:07
like slightly overlapping, you put 2 more sticks.

08:08 - 08:11
And then you go left and right again and then front and back again.

08:12 - 08:16
Progressively get, get larger, with with them.

08:16 - 08:22
The gaps in between, I find are very good for natural wind induction to to blow.

08:22 - 08:24
You'd have to blow less often.

08:24 - 08:27
And then you just you just keep feeding it after that. Like it's it's easy.

08:27 - 08:31
It doesn't if it collapses, it only kinda like tilts a bit.

08:31 - 08:35
And then you just put a bigger one, bigger stick on that side the next time you're building

08:35 - 08:37
your left and right or your front and back.

08:37 - 08:40
And then you just keep you just keep alternating the stacking.

08:40 - 08:41
That's it for me, man.

08:41 - 08:42
Just other things to keep

08:42 - 08:42
in mind. Make sure that

08:42 - 08:43
you're following

08:43 - 08:44
fire regulations. So if there's a fire ban, as much as we

08:44 - 08:44
love our

08:44 - 08:48
campfire, we're we're following fire regulations.

08:48 - 08:55
So if there's a fire ban as much as we love our campfire, we you're not going to do a campfire during a fire ban.

08:55 - 09:00
They have to be built responsibly and be careful about the impact you're having on the environment.

09:01 - 09:04
Try to adapt, depending on what materials you have.

09:04 - 09:12
So if you are front country camping, car camping, you can't just forage for stuff to build your fire.

09:12 - 09:18
You're supposed to leave everything as it is, so you maybe need to bring some newspaper or some

09:18 - 09:23
kindling or something from home or buy kindling and or by firewood.

09:23 - 09:30
With the parks, Ontario Parks firewood, that's often a little bit not seasoned quite enough,

09:30 - 09:32
so it can be kind of smoky.

09:32 - 09:37
Different types of wood will burn a little bit differently, so you might wanna keep that in

09:37 - 09:38
mind too when you're building.

09:38 - 09:43
So hardwoods like oak and maple will burn longer and produce more heat, green.

09:43 - 09:44
Harder to start.

09:44 - 09:48
But harder to because it's hardwood, it's harder to start.

09:48 - 09:54
Green or wet wood can make more smoke and, soft wood like pine might burn very quickly.

09:54 - 09:59
Always prioritize safety, make sure that you're doing things correctly and you're not endangering

09:59 - 10:05
either area of the environment or other people, and always make sure to extinguish the fire

10:05 - 10:07
fully and completely when you're done.

10:08 - 10:12
Yes. No no sizzle, no smoke or steam coming up.

10:12 - 10:14
Make sure you do the entire fire pit.

10:14 - 10:19
Don't just do where you last saw burning because there will be embers buried under, like, in

10:19 - 10:21
in a corner of the pit. Yeah.

10:21 - 10:25
Turn the contents over and make sure that it's it's not embers burning underneath.

10:25 - 10:28
Yep. Stir it up.

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Stir it up.

10:30 - 10:31
Campfire soup.

10:32 - 10:35
Little dong. Alright. I think that is it for us for today.

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Thank you so much for listening.

10:36 - 10:40
Please do tune in again soon, and we'll talk to you then.

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If you would like to reach out to us, we would love to hear from you.

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Our email address is SuperGoodCamping.com com.

10:46 - 10:52
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10:52 - 10:56
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10:56 - 10:57
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We will talk to you again soon. Bye.

10:59 - 11:00
Bye.