diy

Old Wal is a good bloke. He's my father-in-law...

Anyway, he's done a stack of miles around Australia in his caravan and knows a thing or two about camping. Over the next couple of weeks we are going to run a few of his hot tips.

The first is the fire bucket.

Wal reckons his fire bucket...

• can be used with minimum amount of firewood or sticks
• is easy to light with paper, leaves or small sticks
• is safer than open fires in windy conditions, around kids and stops fires from spreading
• cheap and easy to make

And he adds that it's cheap as sticks to run and warm to sit around on cold trips.

Wal's instructions to make the fire bucket are...

• get any old 20 Litre metal container with handle
• cut a hole midway on side to put wood in, make sure it is large enough to fit jaffle iron in
• cut 6 or 7 Small 2mm slots approx 50mm from base around bucket. These allow the air to draw like a chimney. Too much air will make fire roar and too hot.
• Find a piece of old steel mesh or grill (ex old fridge) for a top plate.

He's final hints for the fire bucket are;

I hate sleeping bags.

They end up in knots around my legs.

And image wise - latte sipping city kids use sleeping bags, real men use swags. And I don't want my kids growing up like that so I made them some swags.

Here's how.

First, I bought a second hand industrial sewing machine from ebay - $160. It took me a bit of fiddling to get it sorted but now it goes like a diesel on gas.

Second, I got hold of an old canvas tent. It was a mate's. Someone had given it to him because it had no poles, so he gave it to me.

Third, I cut of the canvas tent and ran up four bed rolls.

Easy really.

And now my kids won't grow up to be latte sipping nancy city boys.

Fire starters can be made from cotton wool and vaseline. Check out the video to see how effective this is.

Recently I posted about making my own Biltong, which is a dried South African meat. We often have used this meat to take on hiking or bushwalking trips. It's lightweight and delicious.

Well the good news is that our test run worked great. The meat took about 5 days to dry, due to it being cut in larger strips and that I wanted a drier meat.

I learned that some of the steaks were a little to wide and curled over. One had to be thrown out as some mould had grown on it where it had curled around.

For flavour I used a coriander seeds, chilli flakes and some black pepper. The weight savings is at least 1/2. I'll have more specific before and after weights next time I make some.

The video below will help you to make your own biltong.