Campfires and Cooking

The Lure of a Campfire

For me, campfires have always been an important part of camping. I love the smell of the wood smoke, (unless it’s in my eyes). The dancing flames are the best hiker TV you can find, and the warmth is always welcome on a cool evening in the woods. 

Cooking on the fire has become a common occurrence in our camp. We started cooking meals on the fire shortly after starting RVing full time and plan to continue as long as we keep camping in areas that allow fires. 

So far, it hasn’t been anything elaborate. Usually chicken thighs, pork chops, turkey burgers or fish. We like to put corn on the cob, unshucked and soaked in water. The water turns to steam and cooks the corn as the leaves protect the kernels from being burned in the flames. 

People leave a lot of stuff behind when they are camping, so we have accumulated a few things that we could use. One is a small grill that is on legs that sits over the coals of the fire. At first we thought it would be too close to the flames, but we have found that it cooks pretty good if the flames have calmed down some. 

We make the fire and feed the logs in until we have a good bed of coals. Throw the grate on after spraying it with some pam and then place the meat on the grill. 

Gathering Wood

Processing wood has become a new hobby for me. I love gathering wood in the forest for the campfire. We have yet to purchase firewood on our travels. If I’m able to gather and process my own wood for free, that is what I’m going to do. I have a bow saw a hatchet and a 2.5 lb maul. I like to process the wood into sizes that will burn efficiently in the fire. If the log is too big, it takes a long time to burn and usually it doesn’t burn with a good flame. I will cut and split the wood in to a size that will burn well. 

When we were camp hosting, one of the benefits of cleaning camp sites is getting to collect the wood that the campers purchased and then left behind. We got a lot of wood that way during our time at The Manor. I would also collect the half burnt larger logs that were left in the firepit and burn them to ash in my firepit. Sometimes I would split the half burned stuff to make it burn a little better. 

There is nothing more comforting than staring into the dancing flames of a crackling fire that you have built. It is mesmerizing. The warmth is always nice and using the fire as a tool to cook a meal is the utmost in self reliance. 

Fire Starters

Usually we can get the fire started by saving burnable trash and using that to get the kindling going, but I have been making nice fire starters for quite a few years. 

They are simple and based on the cotton ball/petroleum jelly concept. I got the idea from a fellow bush crafter that I met on line several years ago. The recipe is simple. Take those round makeup remover pads and dip them in melted petroleum jelly. Let them cool off and put them in a tin or zip loc bag. I can usually get all the ingredients at a local dollar store. I but those foil pie tins to melt the PJ in and the makeup pads come in like a pack of 100. I have found that half a pad is usually good enough to get dry wood burning, so I cut them all in half before dipping them. 

The pad will burn for several minutes and you can even dip it in water before lighting it. The PJ makes the pad practically water proof. If I am trying to start a fire with damp wood, I might use two halves. You can even get them flaming with a fire steel. You just scuff the pad up a little to get something that will catch a spark and they will flame right up. 

A few years ago, I went a whole year or so, lighting dozens of fires and never used a match or lighter. It was just fire steel and the pads or natural tinder like broom sedge or birch bark. Bush crafting is another hobby of mine. I like to learn the primitive ways to thrive in a forest environment. 

Fire Safety

Fire making skills is an important part of bush crafting and camping. Even if you are in a trailer or other RV and staying in campgrounds all the time. It brings me close to nature. 
Of course fire safety is always of the utmost importance. I always check the fire danger in my area and will keep a good eye on the fire. Dousing it with water or dirt when I’m done is an important part of the process. Windy weather always makes me more cautious. 

A daily ritual of sharing marshmallows with Ginger

When I was long distance hiking, I didn’t make fires very often. Usually after walking all day up and down mountains, my energy was at a very low level at the day. What I usually did was set up camp, get water, eat dinner using a cook stove and go to bed or relax for a while. There were several times when I would gather wood with the intention of making a small fire before bed, but after doing the other chores, I was so spent that I didn’t have the energy to make the fire. The times that I did make a fire though, I never regretted. The magic of a fire is very rejuvenating. 

So, I will keep making those fires as we travel around the country. I’m sure there will be times when we are in places that don’t allow fires. Camp Lejeune, for instance, where we are at the time of this writing. They don’t allow any open fires or flames. I’m sure when we get out west, we will encounter other bans in the tinderbox of those western states. No worries. I’ll just wait for the next time were in a lush, damp forest and then I’ll stare into those flames and think about what I can cook on the fire next.