Real World Test of 24hr BOB A Review.

[ChefSimon]

So a few weeks ago I mentioned I took my 24hr BOB to France with me (as hold luggage) on a visit to my mother.

I planned a walkabout in the foothills of the Pyrenees, South of France and live off the land for 36 hours. The idea being I wanted to test my BOB contents in a real world environment somewhere a little better than the Wirral!

BOB Contents:
Hammock
Basha
Hammock Under Quilt
Light weight sleeping bag (2 season)
Fire lighting kit
Change of clothes in stuff sack (double up as a pillow)
24hr MRE ration pack (self heating)
Jacket (in case of rain/cold)
Knife (Gerber LMF2 fixed blade)
Axe
Basic Survival kit (Bear Grylls - Don't laugh, it was a gift but has everything and is compact)
Battery pack (for charging phone and watch)
Solar Charger (for recharging battery pack on the move)
Spork
Cylumes 1x red, 1x blue, 1x white light
Wash kit (wet wipes, toothbrush & paste, small deodorant in case I need to go near another human)
Haribo (always a handy thing for morale)
Water (3x 2l bottles)
Water filter and tablets
Tissues (2 small travel packs)
IFAK (styled for environment and types of injuries that could arise)
A4 printed ariel view of route from Google Maps satellite (as a back up to phone)
10m Paracord & black gaffe tape
Mess Tin

Belt Kit:
Torch
Multitool (gerber suspension)
Folding blade knife (also Gerber LMF)
Compass
(Phone, wallet & watch)

Clothing:
Walking boots -Lowa Zephyr
5.11 taclite trousers
3 layered tops (moisture wicking short sleeve t-shirt, cotton long sleeve t-shirt & jumper so I can mix & match for conditions)
Old military boonie hat to keep sun off my head
Sunglasses
(Stuff sack had 2x socks, underwear, trousers, t-shirt & jumper)

The Plan:
I was dropped off by car at the start point. (wife and mother went shopping) Tab 25km over 7 hours with the aim of hitting a wooded area for my over night stop. Mix of terrain, majority is off road & track (easy going) with a range of 25-410m above sea level.

Camp over night in the wooded area to allow use of hammock, aim to set up camp by 1900 allowing about 90min for personal admin before sunset. Aim was to break camp for about 0800 tab 15km over 5 hours (a lot of up hill for this part) break for lunch about 1300 with a 90 minute rest. Tab the final 20km back to parents house for arrival expected about 2000.

Original planned distance was about 60km. The plan was a direct walk from start point to the village where my parents live. To travel by public road the distance is 87km. Actual distance travelled was 71km due to local ground conditions not allowing direct travel (what was a stream on the map was actually a river & I had to find a safe point to cross. There was also a hill which was easier to navigate around rather than over) I started day one at 1145 and arrived back at my parents house at 1920 on day two.

Points to note:
The whole region I was in had great cell reception, if there was a problem I could call for help and give a 8 figure grid reference with ease. I was using a map app on my phone (with an offline mode)

Safety - A full route map with waypoints was given to the wife before I left so if I was late she could track back. The weather was forecast as fine and clear for the duration of the walk about so no ECW kit was taken. (I could call for pick up worst case) Lows of 12c at night and highs of 25c during the day.

Food - I only took a 24hr MRE with me as the region I was in has plenty of forgeable food growing wild. (Wild asparagus was in season and tasted amazing) along with rocket, herbs etc. I was not planning on killing to eat on this trip. There were several villages close to the route I chose so I could always divert if needed.

Water - I carried a basic 6l on me but had my sawyer filter and sterilisation tablets with me to fill up from a stream & as before villages I could pop into to grab water. (for toilet I buried everything!)

Fire - I had a small fire when in camp but it was fully extinguished before going to sleep and buried with lose soil before breaking camp.

I was not being tactical but made attempts to hide myself overnight and leave no sign I was there when moving out.

About me:
I am ex-Army (left last year) 39 and of reasonable fitness. I can navigate with ease. I could have done this a lot faster but wanted to enjoy the experience. I am already planning a longer trip later this year on my next visit. The weight of the pack was easy for me as I'm used to carrying a lot more.

Summary:
It was a good experience and great fun. I'm glad I took the hammock under sheet as most heat is lost from underneath the hammock by the cool night air. This allowed me to keep the weight and space down in my BOB. As you can see from the attached pictures the scenery was brilliant!

BOB contents worked like a charm and I didn't really have anything I didn't use (with the exception of the survival kit and IFAK, but that's a good thing!) The space I had left in the bag would have ECW kit, spare batteries and more food when in the UK.

Bag weight for this trip = 14kg
weight in UK = 20kg

Backpack is a 5.11 rush 72 with full Molle webbing and additional pouches on the waist straps. It's retro fitted with the 5.11 tier system so I can attach a smaller 45l pack to it if needed.

Hope you have enjoyed this read and look forward to the comments.

[BugOut66]

This was really interesting thanks for posting. Makes me want to do something similar.

How did you get on with your knives on the plane?

[ChefSimon]

The whole bag went inside a suitcase as checked luggage. It added an additional £40 to the flight but just stopped any hassle at the airport. I suppose that when/if it was x-ray'd they could see it was all hiking type equipment.

[Deeps]

Great post mate, enjoy reading other peoples experiences.

[Arzosah]

Wonderful post, thank you for that! Brilliant experiment.

I'm seriously thinking about emergency travel again, so I wrote questions while I was reading through the second time : hope its okay to ask this many.

- thats quite a few knives, I count four plus the axe. What was your thinking for including that many? Did you use all of them?

- what was your experience of the solar charger, was it good enough to use on the move? Is it one of those that fits on the back of your pack?

- how did you light the fire, was it the firesteel? How much kindling was around?

- ecw. I don't know the initials and all that came up on google is Extreme Championship Wrestling! Sorry, what does it stand for?

- I can understand you were actively avoiding people, though not going tactical. How about animals? Even farm dogs, let alone wild animals? Mozzies?

- did you use all your water?


Thanks again.

[Captain Darling]

ECW = Extreme Cold Weather.

[ChefSimon]

Wonderful post, thank you for that! Brilliant experiment.

I'm seriously thinking about emergency travel again, so I wrote questions while I was reading through the second time : hope its okay to ask this many.

Thanks for replying, always happy to answer questions. So, lets give these a go...

- thats quite a few knives, I count four plus the axe. What was your thinking for including that many? Did you use all of them?
The short answer is almost.
Axe: Used for chopping fire wood down & also (some will cringe) digging a hole to do a no.2 in.
Gerber Multitool: Used attachments on it more than the blade. The blade is only 2.5 inches and is limited in it's use so I don't count as a knife myself.
Gerber LMF2 Fixed blade: This one is the almost knife. It's actually my back up which is strapped to the webbing inside the main bag. It's blade is bigger than the folding one which is helpful in some situations.
Gerber folding blade: This has a clip and is always on my belt when out on walkabout. As a quick go-to knife it has advantages, however there is only one small fitting holding the blade to the handle, this is why I carry a fixed blade if I need to do anything strenuous with it. This I used for cutting herbs, wild asparagus etc.
Hope that answers that one, it's a bit long winded.

Knives

- what was your experience of the solar charger, was it good enough to use on the move? Is it one of those that fits on the back of your pack?
Fantastic! Hooked it onto the webbing on my bag and left it be whilst walking. Downside is it's possibly a little big for the needs, however it has 3 USB ports on it so it can charge multiple items at once. It's big enough that it does charge my MacBook battery if it's the only thing plugged in.

- how did you light the fire, was it the firesteel? How much kindling was around?
There is plenty of kindling around that area of France, it's in the middle of wine country so there are plenty of dead vines laying in piles (even in the middle of nowhere which was surprising). They don't get a lot of rain water so material to get a fire going was abundant. I did take precautions of clearing all debris from the fire area and also ringing it in stones which I later moved away again.
For my fire kit, it's 5 items as you will see from the picture. All in small altoid tins. Treated wood shavings, Magnesium powder, matches, lighter and a fire steel. The paracord on the fire steel is fire-cord (has a double strand of treated fibre which will catch easily) as a back up (As are the laces on my boots) In this situation as it was dry a small sprinkling of magnesium powder on the wood shavings and a quick spark from the lighter was all it took. In the UK I have a much larger kit with means of starting fire in the soaking wet.

Fire lighting Kit

- ecw. I don't know the initials and all that came up on google is Extreme Championship Wrestling! Sorry, what does it stand for?
Extreme Cold Weather as it's already been mentioned above. However, I tend to include my waterproofs/wet weather gear within this category as it's usually cold and wet back here in the UK. Although, I must say I much prefer your thinking on ECW... Bring back Big Daddy!

- I can understand you were actively avoiding people, though not going tactical. How about animals? Even farm dogs, let alone wild animals? Mozzies?
Mozzies this time of year are not an issue, although I always carry a small tube of Deet with me in my 1st aid kit. I love the stuff you watch bug fall out the air as they come near you! Wild animals don't really worry me in that region. Wild Boar are prevalent, however are scared of humans due to hunting. The nearest I went to a populated area was about 1km. In the French countryside dogs are not really a big issue compared to here. I would have probably just given it a Haribo sweet and told it to go away... I find that so long as you are moving at a steady pace most animals tend to avoid you. At night I hang my bag off the ground, I'm about 2-3ft off the ground as well so I felt ok with regards to animals. My night stop was well away from any built up area.

- did you use all your water?
Yes! I went through about 10L over the two days of walking. When I crossed the river as it was fast moving and coming down hill from an area that showed no farm/houses along it on my map I refilled two empty canteens through my sawyer filter and popped some steri-tabs in (plus a electrolyte flavoured powder in them. I kept the third bottle as a back up with tap water for 1st aid etc.

Well I hope that answers your questions in a suitable fashion.

[Arzosah]

Thats great, Chef, thank you. The detail is much appreciated, not long winded at all

[BlinkingCory]

Ruddy hell mate, that's about 45 miles I think!
Did the feet hold up OK?
Top effort, well done.

[whenfires]

Thanks for posting this, it's a great write-up and useful to see the practical as opposed to the hypothetical!