The Bushbuddy as a multi-fuel stove

Heating water for coffee on a hot summers day in the Stockholm archipelago

The Bushbuddy is a superb wood-burning stove. This is a well known fact. However, what is less known is that just the pot-stand can work well with alcohol burners and Esbits too. The big advantage of this is that you can have a backup solution if the rain is just pouring down and you don't feel like testing your fire-making skills just at that moment.

The Bushbuddy pot-stand

I've read that some hikers used the Trangia alcohol burner with success. I have only tried with a homemade Pepsi-can stove and that worked very well and also has the advantage that it is extremely light.
When using either alcohol or Esbits, a windshield becomes much more important than when using just wood as fuel is not unlimited (I tend to use a windshield with wood as well to decrease the boil times.). I simply use a folded piece of aluminium from a take-away dinner package. Those who find that too simplistic can probably find themselves some nice titanium at a premium.

 Setup for Esbit use - note the use of the stone and aluminium foil to get the flame at a good distance from the pot

For the Esbits to work best it is important that the burning base is at a good distance from the pot. I don't know what the exact distance should be, but around 3 cm seems good. See this review of Esbit stoves for more info. In order to achieve this I put the Esbits on a stone and a piece of aluminium foil. A more sophisticated solution would be to use something like a Gram Cracker, but frankly this is such a simple thing to build yourself.


Esbits or Alcohol?
What fuel to take as a backup system is a tricky question. Alcohol is easy to find, but it is a more complicated setup and can also add quite a few grams if you have a heavy burner. The Trangia burner, and I guess others as well has the advantage that they can be used for simmering though. Esbits have the important advantage that you can use an Esbit tab as a firestarter in combination with wood. You can also fly with Esbits checked in as far as I know (I have asked and done so on an international flight with the Esbits in the checked-in luggage, but that is no guarantee that all airlines will accept it.).

Field testing?
When it comes to proper field testing on real hiking trips I'm afraid I have to leave that as an exercise to the reader. Even though I bring Esbits on my hiking trips I haven't needed them yet, but I haven't been on any longer trips either. So far I have always found wood even above tree-line in wet conditions. Nevertheless my backyard testing seemed to indicate that the boil times for around 5dl of water was about 6-7 minutes with four small Esbits and probably something similar for alcohol. Perfectly acceptable for solo use I think. It would be nice to know what other peoples experiences are.

Happy new winter year - try a Quinzhee!

In order to burn some calories and have some fun in the snow after christmas I decided to build a Quinzhee snow shelter. You can't get much more lightweight than that since the shelter only requires that you bring a shovel. It's also a lot warmer than a tent since the snow is a great insulator. The downside however is that it requires lot of energy and time to build, but it's also quite fun. It goes without saying however that you should not leave your tent at home unless you are very experienced.

Compared to other snow shelters the Quinzhee is less demanding of the snow conditions. You don't need very deep snow (as is required by a Snow cave or Snow trench for example.) or hard packed snow which is required for Igloos.

The snow heap freezing before being dug out

The process of building a Quinzhee looks like this:

1. Pile up as much snow as you can in a heap using a shovel
2. Compact the heap  a bit by pounding it with the shovel
3. Let the heap freeze for at least 30 minutes
4. Insert 20-30cm sticks evenly into the heap all around the top so that you will not dig through the wall when digging out the living compartment
5. Dig out the living compartment and watch carefully so that you don't dig through the wall when you hit the sticks
6. Optionally create a door of some kind

Step one is by far the hardest one. It took my about 45 minutes with a big shovel and this was for a heap that would probably only fit me in curled up position. It should help to have several people do the shoveling. It is very important to let the heap freeze properly, otherwise it will collapse. Especially when build out of cold powder snow like this Quinzhee. I let this one freeze for 2 hours.

The biggest reason to build a quinzhee - The fun factor

I have heard that those who have tried sleeping in Quinzhee say that it is quite comfortable and very warm, but also a bit damp. So far I have only built mine just outside the house for fun purposes. It's a great activity for the kids, especially the digging. I must say however that the hard work makes me long for the ICEBOX Igloo Tool.

Happy digging - observe the sticks on the roof