The weather can be such a fickle thing. I love a good rain but I know that in the winter that rain is usually followed by a strong blast of cold air after the front moves through.
Last night after riding back to my camp pretty late it was still a balmy 59 degrees. I got in my sleeping bag and was sweating my butt off. You have to be really careful with a down sleeping bag because if it gets too wet you lose much of it's insulation and loft and can get yourself in a miserable predicament. So, I unzipped it and folded it flat and pulled over me a light weight fleece camping blanket I had in my pack. This was much more comfortable and I was soon sound asleep.
Another problem with sleeping in a tent in cool weather is condensation. If you don't open the mesh vent flaps or front door on my tent before you go to sleep, your body heat inside the tent will keep the air a few degrees warmer than the outside air. Water will start to condense on the cooler tent ceiling and walls over night and they will be coated with dew by the morning. All it takes is a slight bump of your head to your tent as you rise up from your sleeping bag in the morning and it will "rain" inside the tent. This can make even the most stalwart religious man cuss like a sailor.
I awoke about 5am this morning and was completely chilled and shivering. I looked at the thermometer on my pack and it was 36 degrees. Man, the temperature really dropped last night in just a few short hours. I bundled up in my sleeping bag, closing the draft collar tight and soon got warm again and back to sleep.
I woke back up around 6:30 am and spent some time getting dressed and moving. I have learned to either sleep in my clothes or keep them in my sleeping bag as it can be pure torture putting on a cold pair of jeans or tennis shoes in the morning. It sure will wake you up better than the strongest cup of coffee.
I have used up much of the locally available fallen limbs and downed trees and have to go ever longer walks to find wood but these brisk walks really help your body and feet warm up. I built a small fire using lots of dry pine straw as kindling and then built a tepee of branches and limbs around it. Smaller sticks and twigs near the kindling and the larger branches on the outside. The fire took little time to light after I gave up on my emergency fire starter and used a piece of toilet paper and my lighter.
I had bought a magnesium fire kit at walmart many weeks ago for an emergency in case my lighter gave out or my water proof matches failed for some reason. It seemed simple enough on the package. Heck , I was bored and wanted to try something different. A challenge. You were supposed to take your knife and scrape off shavings from the magnesium block and form a pile amid the kindling. Then after you get a decent pile, you take the back of your knife and strike a cylinder of flint epoxied to the back of the mag block. It lit all right but it burned so fast and bright it was out in a second and wouldn't start the kindling. I guess there must be a trick that escapes me so far. As with most things on paper they look easy but are hard in practice. Oh well, I will keep trying and see how my results come out next time.
I am now at the house now. It is a comparatively warm 56 degrees in here. Much better than the current blustery 37 degrees outside.
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