Cold Weather Activities

I obtained my cold weather activities experience with the Appalachian Mountain Club, Boston Chapter.  We mostly did cold weather mountaineering in New Hampshire’s White Mountains including, cross country skiing, hiking, snowshoeing and camping.

The AMC Boston chapter ran classes on winter activities starting in early autumn, and with a culminating session on Cold Weather injuries with Dr. Murray Hamlet of the US Army Natick Labs.

The US Northwest organization The Mountaineers publishes educational material.  The ADK Winter school run programs in the Northeast.  Fine reference books are Mountaineering: The Freedom of the Hills, by The Mountaineers  and Don’t Die on the Mountain, Dan Allen, 1998.

ID and Treat Cold Weather Injuries

Images associated with Cold Weather Injuries

Best to start hiking in the summer and into autumn to build up stamina for winter activities.

I also recommend Wilderness First Aid.  Wilderness  First aid is for when a group is an hour or more away from definitive medical care.

Key points:

• Dress in layers
• No cotton as cotton holds moisture.
• Drink lots of water and keep drinking.

In winter weather in New Hampshire, it’s best to be able to cover all exposed flesh with a wicking layer e.g. polypro or silk, followed by a insulation layer such as wool or polyester fleece. This includes the face and hands.  When doing strenuous activities, you may wish to remove the insulation layer but be prepared to redon the insulation when you stop.

My typical winter dress was:

Top:

• Pile or wool hat or balaclava
• Deer skin face mask
• Polypro long underwear top
• Pile insulation jacket
• Gore-tex jacket

Hands:

• polypro inner gloves
• polypro inner gloves
• Wool or pile outer mitten
• Nylon or gore-tex overmit
  
  Eyes
• Wear plastic framed sunglasses to avoid snow blindness
• bring ski goggles in case of active snow.

Legs:

• Polypro long underwear bottom
• nylon shorts
• silk inner sock
• wool outer sock

Feet:

Appropriate winter footwear e.g. Winter boots with winter gaters.

Rules:

Never go alone.

Always go with experienced people.

Keep an eye on urine color – dark urine means trouble e.g. dehydration

When snowshoeing, trade off the front frequently.

Keep an eye on each others mental state. Hypothermia can sneak up and be deadly.

Bring a sleeping bags and tent in case of emergency.

Drink plenty of water.   You can’t drink too  much in the winter as the air dehydrates everyone.

Lighting

Bring headlamps that function well in cold weather. If you are walking out after dark, headlamps can be a lifesaver. Lithium battery or Nickel metal hydride (NIMH) batteries work well if the headlamp is designed to use them.

Adam Selene   November 2014

Cold Weather Activities by Adam Selene is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

The lack of character is widespread

When trying to share links to my blog posts to the calguns forum, this week,  of which I was a dues paying member, an administrator going by the moniker “Kestryll” deleted my posts and then blocked me. I then tried to explain to him what I was trying to do,  to help all constituents get their rights back by sharing some links to my Creative Commons blog posts on Oath breakers and why we have the 2nd amendment in the bill of rights,  he banned me for life and refunded my dues.

Seems to me that it must be that Calguns doesn’t want us to reacquire our RTKBA as their actions of deleting my post and membership in calguns would seem to indicate or, The administrator is ignorant.  This is likely indicative of a serious lack of character.

It seems the problem of a lack of character is not unique to our officeholders but may also be lacking in our patriotic organizations which are theoretically trying to reobtain our rights.

I also posted to the Boy Scouts of America Group on Linkedin.  Many Scouters were supportive. It makes me laugh but not just a bit concerned that at least one called my ideas radical.  As I said in reply to one post, these ideas were political in 1775-1786, and are set. Of course, your mileage may vary.

One of my friends replied to a reposting of a Facebook posting about “NRA Board Ted Nugent calls for the Assassination of President Obama” that she was shocked by my reposting. I had included a comment that I hoped it didn’t come to that. That education would help.  Reminds me a bit of the reception of the Anti Nazi German group The White Rose by the Nazi Party.

Sigh. What’s a patriot to do?

Adam Selene October 2014

The lack of character is widespread by Adam Selene is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

OA W4N Conclave

I went to the Order of the Arrow Conclave on September 20,2014 for W4N  at Camp Pollock, Forest Lawn Scout Reservation, Lake Arrowhead. I went to help with the rifle range from 1400-1600.

It was great to be there. I love being a scouter.I met the folks helping with the shooting sports.

Unfortunately: 1) there were multiple events scheduled from 1400-1600.

2)  we didn’t get any scouts that had parental permission slips so we had no scouts able to shoot.  Three adults did some shooting.

Hopefully we can do a better job planning next time.

Notes for Planning:

Before event: Make sure permission forms go home to the scout participants and are downloadable from the event website

At event: collect forms from scouts and issue wrist bands for those who provided a signed permission slip.

Adam Selene

OA W4N Conclave by Adam Selene is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.