Woodlore Blog

First of all, we’d like to take this opportunity to thank you, our followers, for your continued support and interest in the Ray Mears and Woodlore Blog over this past year. If you’ve enjoyed what you’ve found here so far, stay tuned for more articles and reports from the Woodlore camp, including your own contributions.

However, if you’d like to hear more regular and exclusive news updates from us, you can now follow Woodlore on both Facebook and Twitter. Additionally, Woodlore now has its very own YouTube channel, which already features a number of instructional videos from Ray for you to check out.

Through these networking sites, we aim to keep our followers up-to-date with snippets of news on the kit, courses and expeditions that have yet to be released to the general public. Essentially, we will provide you with the news that you won’t find anywhere else.

To follow Woodlore on these sites, please visit the following links:

We are pleased to announce that, as of this September, attendees of our Canoeing in the Ardeche expeditions will be given the chance to earn their BCU Star Awards during their course. These Paddlesport Performance Awards will help you gain the control and experience necessary for you to embark on your own wilderness canoeing expeditions, making them an excellent addition to our current course syllabus.

Paddling down the Ardeche Gorges, France

If you’d like to gain these qualifications, surrounded by the stunning scenery of the Ardeche Gorge this September, please book one of the few remaining places available here. (more…)

The end of June saw the final Introduction to Bushcraft course take place for 2011; we can’t believe just how quickly the year is disappearing!

A morning view on the Introduction to Bushcraft course, by Bryce Groves

We’ve had a fantastic run of Introduction to Bushcraft courses this year, commencing over the warm and sunny Easter weekend in April.  This season our courses were led by Keith Whitehead, Nick Thompson and Dan Hume, and we have received some very enthusiastic feedback from the clients who attended:

“Thank you all for a fantastic experience over the all-too-short 3 days. Dan and Kevin were brilliant, patient, meticulous, inspirational instructors and they were great fun too. It was reassurring to have the staff team including Mark and Ross ever present; their discrete support and hearty encouragement made me feel much more brave and open to possibilities than I naturally might have been. I was so impressed with how effortlessly (seemingly) I was taught so much at pace in such a short time; while still feeling like the whole event was my own experience. I was concerned about how I would cope on the introductory course but now focused on getting myself on the Fundamental Bushcraft asap! Thanks once again for a truly inspiring and empowering experience.” - Shelley Mathias

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If you’re thinking of joining us on our next Arctic Expedition with Lars Falt and Ray Mears, the following video will give you a good idea of what you could be getting up to next February:

For a limited time only, Woodlore are offering  a free Silva Expedition 15TDCL Compass (normally priced at £49.00) to anyone who books a place on either the exhilarating Wilderness Navigation or the exciting Junior Expedition Skills courses for this year. This offer is availble from now until the 31st July 2011, and your free compass will be sent to you once we have received your final payment for the course.

The Silva Expedition 15TDCL Compass is a highly recommended piece of equipment and features on the kit list for both of these courses.

The Silva Expedition 15TDCL compass

The dates we have available to book are;

Wilderness Navigation:  4th – 10th September 2011

The Wilderness Navigation course is available to anyone over the age of 17.  The course provides a thorough, no-nonsense grounding in all aspects of map and compass, equipping you with the skills to traverse open country or dense forest, day or night, in all weathers.

Junior Expedition Skills:  14th – 19th August 2011

Junior Expedition Skills:  21st – 26th August 2011

The Junior Expedition Skills course is for those who have already attended our Junior Fundamental Bushcraft course, and would like to take their skills further.

Woodlore's Wilderness Navigation course

Office Team member Becky had some time out of the office in April to attend our Wilderness Navigation course, led by James Bath.  Here’s what Becky had to say about her experience;

“Back at the beginning of April I was let out of the office for a week (thanks boss) to attend the Woodlore Wilderness Navigation course. I like a bit of a ramble at the weekends as well as the odd longer distance walk but my understanding of the map and compass were at best basic before this course. I was a little nervous about camping out in the woods rustic style for a whole week (I haven’t slept under canvas for more than the odd night for about 20 years) but with help from the Woodlore Outdoor Team I settled to it very quickly.

Course Leader James (Woodlore’s very own Head of Ops) promised great weather – apparently that particular course is always blessed so I packed sunscreen as well as Ultrathon. For the first couple of days the sunscreen didn’t get a look in as we got to grips with the basics of Navigation sometimes in the rain, wind and drizzle and after dark too. The weather wasn’t all bad those first days as I do recall the sun on my face as I attempted to walk across a meadow blindfolded!

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Recently, Woodlore field staff member Adrian Newton e-mailed us to let us know that the first aid training provided to him by Jamie and his team at Fusion Medical Limited, during Woodlore’s Training Week, had really paid off.

Luckily the incident did not occur on one of our courses, but at Adrian’s place of work.  It just goes to show, accidents can happen anywhere and you never know when you may need this life-saving training! 

This is what Adrian had to say;

“Hi everyone in the office,

Hope everyone is well. I just wanted to pass on my thanks to Woodlore and Jamie for all the first aid training you have given us. I got to use it for real yesterday when a scaffold collapsed at work with a friend, Stewart on top of it.

Stewart fell twelve feet, hitting his head on the way down. I wasn’t the first person there and Stewart had been moved to a safer place away from the scaffold. He was conscious but had blood pouring from the back of his head. I got him to remain in the position I found him, sitting upright, keeping his head still. I was worried about a neck or back injury. He complained his back hurt but there was nowhere flat to lie him down. I stopped the bleeding with every bandage in the first aid kit. Standard kits for the workplace really are rubbish. There wasn’t even any surgical gloves let alone anything to support his neck.

The paramedics arrived and gave him a thorough examination. They put a brace around his neck and were happy enough to walk him off site. He was x-rayed at the hospital and had twelve staples in the cut. He’s back at work today. Damn! He’s got a hard head.  

Thanks again to the company for organising the courses for us and if it’s at all possible, could you send my thanks to Jamie. It could have been a lot worse, but thanks to you guys I didn’t feel overwhelmed dealing with it.

See you all soon.”

If you are interested in attending a first aid training course, Woodlore, teamed with Fusion Medical Limited, have several excellent courses running, ranging from a 2-day to week long courses:

Woodlore’s Wilderness Emergency Medic Courses

All of our first aid courses are approved by the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and provide you with a certificate.  We  include mainly scenario-based learning as, after many years of teaching experience, we find this is the best way to remember such vital information.

At this time of year, James Bath and Di Taylor from the Woodlore offices would normally be returning from France, after running our Canoeing in the Ardeche courses with canoe instructor Blue.  However, after the major flooding of last year and the inconsistent water levels we ‘ve experienced for the past few years, we decided to run the course in September for this year.

We expect that in September the weather will still be excellent, but with lower water levels, so we’ll able to paddle every day!  Furthermore, with the school summer holidays over, the river should be much quieter too.  This year we have revamped the Ardeche course to include evening lectures to allow more time on the water.

We still have some places remaining for this year’s Canoeing in the Ardeche course in September, so please visit the website and book up if you are interested to avoid missing out on this fantastic experience.

Clients tackling rapids on the Ardeche river in France

We will be releasing the 2012 Canoeing in the Ardeche course dates later in the year.

We are pleased to announce the release of Woodlore’s 2012 winter course dates and, after the release of our new UK courses for 2012, we couldn’t let the overseas courses go by without a new one too!

We are very excited to reveal a new course developed by Brian Desmond, our long term friend and colleague in Norway.  The new course is called Nordic Intermediate Ski Touring, and to attend you need to have experience in Nordic Skiing, either with one of the existing Woodlore courses in Norway or similar.  In addition to this new course, we will also be offering two Nordic Skiing courses in January/February and a Heroes of Telemark course in March.  All of these courses will now be run Glyn Sheppard, the chief instructor at Brian’s training centre in Norway.  

The striking scenery of Norway, where our skiing expeditions take place

In 2012 we will also be running our ever-popular Arctic Experience courses in February, led by Ray Mears and Lars Falt.  If you are looking to attend a course with Ray Mears in 2012, the Arctic Experience will be a fantastic opportunity. If you are interested please book quickly as these places are bound to fill fast.

Last week we held the first Woodlore Woodsense course of the year; here’s what course instructor James Bath had to say about it:

Clients checking their ageing stands on the Woodsense course

Perfect weather, keen clients and a week of tracking.  What more can a Woodlore instructor ask for?

The course season has been flying by so far with plenty of happy clients and great weather.  The ‘T-Shirt tans’ of the outdoor team are coming along nicely as well!

This week sees our first Woodsense tracking course of 2011.  Tracking is one of the most important skills in the subject of bushcraft and is not, as many would have you believe, some black voodoo art. Neither do you have to have been raised by wolves to get to grips with the skill. We hardly ever follow a ‘Man Friday’ set of footprints in soft sand but look for more subtle sign – something out of the ordinary in the environment in which we’re working. If you walked into your living room at home and saw the T.V. remote wasn’t in its usual place on the armchair but on the coffee table you would notice. It’s exactly the same principle. Aside from being a great challenge and extremely addictive, tracking can only enhance our enjoyment, observation and skills when we are in the outdoors; we notice the deer flicking its tail, the spiney oak up in the canopy and the edible fungi before anyone else. However, the best thing about tracking is its accessibility. You need only two things: time spent outdoors and your eyes.

Those of you who track will understand my enthusiasm. Those who have never tried it trust me; get outside, switch on, take your time and enjoy. Your time in the woods will never be the same again.

Clients looking for sign on the Woodsense course

 N.B. Please note, that from 2012 onwards the Woodsense course will be re-named the Woodlore Tracking course.