Me and my 5yr old son hiked to an amazing natural stone maze hidden in the Blueridge Mountains. We went winter camping without a tent but the temperature dropped 20 degrees and it snowed on us. But luckily we didn't let that stop us and while hiking we found a natural stone maze and built a primitive survival shelter in between some large rock outcroppings and while it was well bellow freezing we were very cozy.
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00:00Luke and Nate here at the Outdoor Boys YouTube channel and today we might have
00:03bitten off more than we can chew. We decided we want to do a little winter
00:07survival camping and so we drove three hours into the Blue Ridge Mountains and
00:12turns out the weather forecast is completely messed up. My phone says that
00:18right now it's 40 degrees. It's not 40 degrees it's 24 degrees so we are
00:25significantly colder than we expected. We'll see what happens. You ready Nate?
00:30Yeah. Let's do it.
00:37Okay, try to get your leg up over there.
00:47Well in a couple weeks me and Nathan are going up to Alaska to do some survival
00:52camping videos over Christmas so I'm glad we're getting a little bit of
00:56winter camping practice before that.
01:00You getting too hot buddy? Yeah, we don't want you to get sweaty. Yeah, you get sweaty in the
01:06wintertime and then once you stop you're wet and cold.
01:16I bet you totally could. There's like a cave here. Man that wouldn't be a
01:21bad place to build a shelter except for it's muddy and wet down there. You want to
01:28climb on top? See what we can see?
01:43One thing, brush the snow off your pants because that snow is gonna melt and get
01:48your pants wet. You know, it's actually starting to snow again. We might get some
01:54more snow.
01:58Look at this place.
02:06Yeah, that is the largest icicle. Look at that big icicle you've got.
02:19This is awesome. Oh look at that path.
02:38Yeah?
02:48Oh my goodness, look at that. You can fit in there?
03:01Oh, dad can't fit. Dad's too fat. Oh, this is the...
03:19Hey, you can hold on to these roots.
03:25Careful, there's a lot of cliffs here. Go slow, Nathan. Let's go back down
03:39before we get lost. Yeah, we gotta climb down this thing.
03:55Is this cool or what?
04:08Just be careful. Remember, those spots are too small. I can't get down there to
04:13help you if something bad happens.
04:16You know, it's actually a bit warmer in some of these tight spots.
04:44Oh, look at this one. This is just cool. I think this is one of the neatest places
05:00we've ever hiked, isn't it? Yeah. You know, I think even daddy can fit this one.
05:13Well, there's a little Nathan spot. Look at that. You got your head? I can go down
05:30this one too. What do you think, Nathan? Should we try to do camping here? This looks
05:45pretty good. Oh, look at this spot, Nate. You walk in, I'll walk around. Yeah, there
06:02you go. Hey, Nathan, come back here. I found the biggest icicle ever. Do you want me to
06:24pick this one for you? Oh, it's an ice club. You can club a baby seal with that thing.
06:42Your gloves are getting wet, buddy. We've been here. Yes, we have. There's our backpacks.
06:57They're still safe and sound. We'll have to see if there's even any left. You're going
07:05that way? Yeah, I'll come with you. Get down in there and lay down and see if it's flat
07:28and comfortable. It's pretty soft but dry. First things first, I think we need to get
07:34a bunch of firewood. We want to have a fire to keep us warm all night. It takes a lot
07:38of wood and we need big wood too. Come here, Nathan, I need to see you. I'm going to put
07:43my tracker on you, okay? You can track me? Yeah, but listen, I want you to stay always
07:50where you can see me, okay? Let's get some firewood.
08:20Go on, daddy, go on.
08:36Wait. Hey.
08:38Why did you bring rope? Yeah, I brought it for the tarp in case we needed it.
09:09I didn't just pull that out. I just took the sheathing off this.
09:23Hey, Nathan, look at that lower lip. Oh, that's the lip of a cold camper.
09:30Well, having the rocks like they are makes it really nice for keeping you out of the smoke.
09:38The wind either blows that direction or it blows that direction and so I'm never in the smoke.
09:44But there is a little bit of a breeze coming in around that corner and if we can get rid
09:50of that breeze, it's going to warm up really good in this little crevice. So I've got a
09:54tarp that I'm going to try to string over that opening.
10:07Well, this tarp has blocked the wind really good and now that fire's heat is really getting
10:13trapped in this space between the rocks. It's warming up pretty nice.
10:18You feeling better, bud? Yeah.
10:20It's a lot warmer in here, isn't it?
10:22Water dripping off the top of the rocks from the ice melting up there.
10:30Nathan had a little accident. He slipped on the ice and cut his hand a little bit.
10:39Let's go warm it up by the fire, okay?
10:42You feeling better, bud? Yeah.
10:45Yeah, that was scary, wasn't it?
10:46I tend to not carry first aid kits because anything you can fix with a first aid kit
10:51isn't that serious, frankly. But since camping with Nathan and the other boys, I've realized
10:56that they really like having a first aid kit and if you don't have it and they get hurt,
11:01they really wonder what kind of wacko they've gone camping with.
11:05You're glad I had the first aid kit, right? Yeah.
11:16There you go.
11:25Okay, this is about as cozy of a survival shelter as I've ever had, but there is a little
11:31bit of a problem here. We're getting dripping. This is going up here and melting all of that
11:37ice and it's coming down here and it's running here and then it is dripping onto my sleeping
11:45bag. It's dripping right about there, it's dripping right about there, it's dripping
11:49right about there. I'm hoping in a couple of hours it might dry up a little bit and
11:53we might get rid of this problem. But in the meantime, I better move my sleeping bag or
11:57it's going to get wet.
11:59Come sit down.
12:00You want to open the egg banger?
12:05It's good that mine didn't spill the water.
12:10I really enjoy doing these winter camp outs with Nathan. We had a ball last year, didn't
12:15we? Yeah. This last winter we dug a snow cave in the Rocky Mountains. We did camping with
12:21just a lean-to and some animal pelts in six degree weather in Alaska last winter. So we've
12:28had some fun adventures and we've got some pretty cool stuff planned this winter too.
12:33It's easy for the spoon.
12:41There's one foot. She's right there.
12:46Sorry, you got attacked by the GoPro.
12:49You got your Desiree pillow.
12:51Pillow.
12:55Kit Kat. Kit Kat dessert.
13:00Well guys, we got kind of lucky. The fire's melted when it's going to melt and the dripping
13:05stopped. So I don't think we have to worry about getting wet in the night from cave drips.
13:10Sun is set and it's only 5.30. Do you want to sit and watch a little movie? Awesome.
13:16Awesome.
13:19I don't know how many times we've watched this on camp outs.
13:27How many hand warmers do you want? Nathan here is in a 15 degree bag and the high today
13:34was 25. So it's going to get cold tonight when this fire goes out. So we are going to
13:42load him up.
13:46Okay, let's get you all zipped up.
13:53Do you want me to close up your sleeping bag?
13:55Yeah.
13:59There you go.
14:02If you get cold, you let me know. I'll throw more hand warmers in there, okay?
14:07Nathan's snoring away and the fire stoked up. I'm going to just kind of play it by ear
14:13and see whether or not I let it burn all night or not. I think I'll be warm with or
14:17without it, but it is sure comfy having this fire. The downside is I don't sleep as well
14:23when I sleep next to a fire because you're always worried about the fire, you know, a
14:28spark flying on you and burning a hole in your bag or something, you know. So it kind
14:32of stresses me out sometimes trying to sleep at night with a fire. But we'll just see what
14:38happens.
14:44Well, it's about four in the morning. I'm hearing some weird noises outside. It sounds
14:49like either a tree fell down or there's like a bear wandering around out there. But I'll
14:57just stoke up the fire and see what happens.
15:01Well, good morning. It is 7 a.m. and the sun is just beginning to rise and we got a little
15:07guy here who's had a good night's sleep. You sleep well, Nathan? Yeah. The fire pretty
15:13much was on all night long and we still have quite a bit left. So how about we stoke up
15:18the fire and get it really warm in here? You want that? Yeah.
15:25There you go. We got some apple chicken breakfast sausages here. I'm going to put these over
15:31the fire.
15:38There you go. There you go. There's a handle for your sausage.
15:50It got cold last night, even inside the cave. There's ice in my water bottle.
15:56I'm packing everything up and I'm getting the fire roaring so that Nathan can get out
16:00of his sleeping bag and get dressed in some relative comfort. That's dad duty right there.
16:08Get his clothes warmed up here.
16:17All right, we're all packed up. Just need to get that fire and kind of return things
16:21back to the way they were as best we can.
16:38Well, we got everything picked up and put back. Shall we go home, Nate? Yeah.
16:52I think these trees are so cool. Look at this.
17:02This place is so easy to get lost in.
17:07All right. Over here to the left.
17:19Got a little super boost. Nathan, did you have fun? Yeah. That was the first time I've
17:25ever slipped in a cave like an outlaw. But I hope you guys enjoyed this short little
17:29camping and adventure video. We do lots of these sort of camp outs and check out our
17:34camping and adventure playlist with all of our videos. And stay tuned and don't forget
17:38to click subscribe because we have got some awesome winter survival camping videos coming
17:43up and I'll see you guys next Saturday morning.
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