Shit hitting the fan? Survival essentials? Or just better camping kit choices? A look at evolving the overnight bag a little to meet new challenges.

I do like camping. With all the sniper events on the calendar as well as milsims taking precedence over simple Sunday skirmishes, the camping kit has seen a lot of use this winter. And it’s absolutely fine, as is my Airsoft kit. But…more kit is more good. And this week I’ve been putting a bit of thought into revamping it a bit. So, what’s wrong with it at the moment?

Well, nothing really. It’s been stripped back over the years to quite a modern, lightweight setup with all gadgets and bases covered. But I’ll start by describing what I use it for. I occasionally, like much of the rest of the working population, get a weekend off. Most of the time it’s for Airsoft, but sometimes I like escaping the city and heading to the mountains for some wild camping. There’s usually a long hike involved which is great exercise, and that’s driven a reduction in weight and bulk. Although I’ve been doing this sort of thing since I was a small child so it doesn’t bother me too much. During the summer, if I’m hiking for a few days I like to make use of campsites with all their facilities which makes the whole experience more pleasant and less sweaty.

On the Airsoft side, I love my 2 day events which, with a Friday arrival, can involve two nights of camping. Either in a tent, or more often derelict buildings. Wherever there’s shelter available it makes sense to use it. If not, I have a range of tents to take depending on the weather etc. To that end, a lot of my kit is either olive green or military surplus because it fits the vibe. But that’s not an issue.

On the last event I did, my beloved Trekology UL80 sleeping mat, which is comfortable as hell, finally decided to pop and my ass got dumped on a cold concrete floor for the night. And despite thinking I’d taken a lot of gel fuel for my stove, lending a chunk to a teammate led to it running out much faster than I imagined. It didn’t matter too much, because ultimately I know I’m going home the next day so I just shrug and get on with it. No hot food? There’ll be a KFC on the way home. Uncomfortable sleep? It’s ok, I’ll be in my own warm bed the next night and all will be forgotten.

The fuel issue bugged me though. And the sleeping mat. And I thought “what would I have done if I was out for longer than the one night?”. My kit is great for short term, but what about longer events? Like Border Wars or Berget? What if I wanted to go wild camping for a week? Or worse, perhaps there’s a need to stay outside a bit longer.

Ignoring all the doom-mongering and zombie apocalypse ideas, I did have a read a couple of days ago about the preparedness leaflet given to all citizens of Sweden. Here’s the link to the PDF. It’s a good read. There was one section I read a few times.

Yeah there’s some bigger stuff there than I’ll cover in an Airsoft blog, however this combined with recent experience has got me swapping a few things out in my kit. The challenge I’ve set is, can I make myself more self sufficient in the field?

I’ve always maintained snipers are a different breed of Airsofter. We’re used to being out there by ourselves. Working with the environment. And if I’m out at an event doing recce or causing havoc for the enemy team, I don’t want to have to trudge back to the safe zone on the evening to live out of a campervan while having warm beers. I want to be able to stay out there where nobody sees, able to quickly set up camp, have a decent sleep and then quickly pack away ready to go again in the morning. Being able to refuel from the local environment is a consideration too, because sometimes there’s just no access to Amazon or local supermarkets.

How to go about it then?

My sleeping mat popped. So, I’ve replaced it with a Z type foam folding mat, which has the benefit of being warmer anyway but obviously a bit of comfort is lost. However, it won’t fail. It’s something that doesn’t need constantly inflated and deflated and packed away carefully. It’s much larger but weighs less than my UL80. It was £5 in an outdoor store sale bin and provides that all-important insulation from the floor. I do have a Snugpak self inflating mat which I ditched a few years ago because of the weight, but a new sleeping bag has saved a ton of space and weight and is much warmer so I’ve saved a bit there.

My cook system, I love to bits. It’s the Crusader kit. But, it ran out of fuel. So I’ve been out and bought one of those flat-pack wood burning boxes for around £12 off Amazon. Here’s a link. Is it as stealthy as the Crusader with fuel gel? No, there’ll be smoke off it but at least I can use it just to burn whatever is around me. I’m not one of these guys who needs a constant supply of tea or coffee. The hot brown water drinks don’t appeal; I’m happy with just cold water. However, a hot meal on a night is great for morale and if it’s dark, few are going to see your little smoke cloud anyway. Of course, for general camping use it’s ideal anyway purely on the grounds of not needing gas canisters, fuel gels, alcohol or anything else.

To harvest fuel, I was very impressed watching Spook the Sniper quickly gather firewood using a Bahco Laplander folding saw. He’s a skilled woodsman, and I think compared to the handheld chain type saws, the Laplander isn’t at any risk of snapping and I have no need of huge logs anyway – that stove wouldn’t fit any in. Combined, these two items are heavier than the Crusader kit but pack better due to the shape. This is one of the sacrifices to make with the kit.

To do all the cooking, I could take my smaller Crusader metal mug and lid, or it’s a good excuse to use the larger bucket and pan combo that is the East German mess tin set. Or at least I think it is, there’s no markings on it anywhere to indicate origin, probably a repro, but the design is good and it’s been sat on my shelf for years. Being a larger container means I can stuff a few bits of food inside, perhaps some powdered soups and sauces or ration packs.

Water is obviously important, and rather than carrying ten bottles of the stuff, I have the Sawyer Mini water filter and two water bottles – one for cooking, one for drinking. If I run out of drinking water, there’s an emergency reserve in the other bottle until I can get somewhere to refill. The drinking bottle is a British Army issue Osprey water bottle (get the real one, not a copy, although the BCB one is pretty decent), which is the best one I’ve had down the years in terms of not leaking. The backup is an Austrian Army (yes there’s a theme here) steel water bottle. If needed, the steel one can be heated up where the plastic one can’t. The Sawyer Mini on its own cuts out a huge amount of weight and bulk from multiple water bottles, and provides an almost endless supply of water, so that ticks a lot of boxes.

I try not to carry or rely on lots of electronic gadgets for obvious reasons. They can die quickly, meaning you need an alternative anyway. I’ve been watching a lot of loadout videos this last week from various units across the world and it’s interesting to see how many use more traditional fieldcraft kit and methods despite the abundance of modern technology. Of course, I can carry powerbanks and solar panels, wires, GPS, laptop, phone, radio etc but this is all extra weight, and if there’s no signal or network issues it’s no good anyway.

One thing I did want to change but haven’t yet is my tent. I have a few mountain tents and one warm but heavy DPM canvas tent, but the lighter weight option is undoubtedly the British Army basha with a bivvy bag. It’s good, but I’ve got my eye on an Austrian Army shelter half setup. This consists of two ponchos that clip together to form a tarp, supported by two poles to make a basic A-frame tent. The advantage over a basha is that it’s enclosed at both ends, eliminating the need for a bivvy bag and providing better all-round shelter in case the weather turns shit. And you can build earth up around the edges to keep bugs out. It’s a rubberised plastic rather than the ultra-heavy canvas US versions so is a lot lighter than most pup tents. Usually available for very cheap, the wave of prepping and war in Europe at the moment seems to have depleted stocks somewhat. Here’s a short video of it anyway.

With all that swapped out, it gives my camp the option to go for a lot longer than one night. I’ll be taking my EDC pouch that I made during COVID as well with some essential basics in (article here) but the goal is still to run as light as possible.

Any suggestions for other useful kit? Anything you have in your bag that works? I’m always up for new kit.