July 19-24, 2020 Expedition near Mt. Rainier
Designed for hikers, backpackers, traditional skills enthusiasts of any level, scout leaders and anyone seeking to gain confidence in wilderness skills. This course helps you help you achieve comfort in the wilderness, with or without supplies from stores like REI, Cabela’s, or your local grocer.
Learn the arts of foraging, shelter building, water purifying, food preserving, fire carrying and more as we travel to one of the best and most beautiful places to live off the land. Learn traditional ways to start fire by friction rendering matches and lighters unnecessary.
Learn to find and build natural shelters in case of wilderness emergencies. Learn the most critical wild edible plants for survival, and forage for grubs and other delectable insects which are a safe source of protein in survival situations.
We will use the gifts nature supplies us, including natural bug spray, soap and soft bough beds. We will construct a waterproof lean-to, warm debris beds, safe fire pits, reflective heat walls, and buried hot beds. You will have the option of building a group survival camp, or constructing your own.
Depending on when you feel ready to embark on a solo survival trek, you can spend 1-4 days putting your skills to the test. This is your own wilderness survival trek, and no matter how you choose to do it, we will work to help you make it the most incredible outdoor experience of your life.
Goals & Skills Covered:
The goal of this camp session is to prove to yourself that you can survive a wilderness emergency and begin living in traditional comfort. If you already have some experience, this camp is also a good test to see how to take your skills from the “emergency survival” level to the “primitive living” and “stone age living” levels.
Skills covered during this camp session may include, but are not limited to the following list:
- Practice the Critical Order of Emergency Survival.
- Learn the Top 10 Hazards in nature and what to do in case of Cougar & Bear Encounters.
- Emergency, Traditional & Most Practical Survival Shelters. (debris hut, lean-to, wickiup, thatch hut, earth lodge, split cedar cabins, and pit houses, including fire drafting strategies)
- Discover the Best Way To Make A Fire
- Become an expert with the Bow Drill method of fire-by-friction and become introduced to hand drill, pump drill, pressure pump, fire plow, and more.
- Natural Water Purification (seeps, filters, rock boiling, and locating natural springs)
- Honorably Harvest the Top 10 Most Important Survival Plants
- Learn the Top 10 Lostproofing, Navigation & Orienteering Skills including map and compass.
- Learn the most important medicinal herbs of the northwest.
- Cook over an open fire and how to “rock boil.”
- Harvest and cook with cattails, hazelnuts, and more.
- Practice wilderness medicine emergency response scenarios.
- Learn Knife Safety, and even more important, efficient use of tools during survival situations.
- Learn Natural Selection Forestry, using Hatchets & Axes.
- Spin natural rope for your bow-drill kit (double and triple reverse wrap using nettle, fireweed, cedar, etc.)
- Burn out your own bowl and spoon for eating.
- Smoke and jerky wild meats, and make pemmican.
- Fishing, depending on your license.
Availability:
Open and geared for young adults with no prerequisite, although we recommend attending at least one of our weekend workshops or other camps and expeditions in the past for greatest success in the course. Youth may attend the Wilderness Survivors Side of the Mountain camp running simultaneously.
Course Instructors:
Patrick Wiley, M.S. assisted by directors Kim & Chris Chisholm
Arrival, Departure, Directions & Transportation Options:
Sunday 4:30 Starting Point: Sahara Creek DNR Horse Camp, 262nd Ave E., Ashford WA 98304 with additional transportation options from the Puyallup Wolf Campus 2:00, Tacoma Bus/Amtrak Station 1:30, and SeaTac Airport 1:00.
Friday Afternoon Ending Points: If you would like any friends/family members to join us for our end-of-survival-trek Lunch Feast, have them meet you behind Faith Baptist Church, 28514 SR 706 East, in Ashford, one mile down the highway from Sahara Creek, at the turn-off to our primitive camp area. They are also welcome to join us for our final afternoon enrichment workshops taking place from 1-4 p.m. before we depart at 5 p.m. Or for an additional fee, we can drop you off at a bus/train station in Tacoma around 6:30 p.m., or take you to Puyallup for pick-up at 8 p.m., or bring you to SeaTac Airport on Saturday, or stay over and join us for for the Tracking Wolf Country expedition taking place the following week.
Tuition:
Training Camps & Expeditions are $795. To reserve your spot, make a $200 deposit and your balance will be due upon arrival. Cost includes everything from Sunday-Friday including survival knife, firesteel or field guide depending on topic. The only additional expenses you may incur for our courses are for travel and specific gear, although we have extras in case you can’t acquire something. You will also need to show you have health insurance, or check with us for recommendations on inexpensive temporary insurance if necessary.
Registration:
Credit/Debit Card Registration Option: Just call us at 425-248-0253 and we will take your registration securely over the phone.
Check/Mail/Email Registration Option: Download our Microsoft Word or PDF Registration Form to your computer, fill out one per participant for whom we do not yet have a registration form on file (so not needed for returning campers) and send or email back to us. We also have a Bilingual Chinese-English Registration Form PDF or Word Doc. You can also send a check deposit payable to Wolf Camp, 1026 14th St. SW, Puyallup WA 98371 or fill out the registration form and pay deposits by calling with a credit card, or using paypal as described below.
Or Use PayPal to register online securely with a credit/debit card or via direct withdrawal from your bank account. Use the link below (might not be visible if you are using “reader view” on your phone or other device) or sign into paypal.com and “send money” to our email address: (we’ll get back to you with any additional information we may need)
Or email us to be put on our our list for this program in the future. We always keep your information absolutely private, and will never share it. You can also like our facebook page to keep in better touch, and once you’ve attended a program, please review us on our Better Business Bureau, Yelp & Google pages.
Refund Policy: Payments are not refundable unless we don’t accept your application. If you cancel in advance of the program start time for any reason, you may receive a full credit good through the following calendar year on appropriate and available programs listed on our schedule, although an additional deposit may be required to secure your spot in the future program. If a program you sign up for is canceled and not rescheduled at a time you can attend, you may receive a full refund except in case of natural (weather, geologic, etc) disasters, government shutdowns, conflicts or curfews, or other unforeseen emergencies making it impossible for staff and/or attendees to reach or use program locations, in which case all payments made will be held by us without expiration date for your future use in appropriate/available programs of your choice. No refund, nor credit, is given if a participant is asked to leave a program for inappropriateness as determined by our kids, youth and adult agreements for participation.
Course Preparation: Agreements, Packing List and FAQ’s
Click here for our Expedition Agreements