Adventure to live-booklet Adventure to live-booklet | Page 24

HOW TO
LIGHT
A FIRE
Lighting a fire is only half the battle. The way you build a fire can affect how long the fire will last and how much heat it will give
off. This will teach you how to build a fire in any setting.
If you're building a fire outdoors, you'll need to be a bit more
resourceful than if you had the comfort of a fireplace. This
means you'll need to find the wood, kindling, and tinder, and
you'll need to build a small fire pit if you don't already have
one. Also, since you
don't have a grate, you'll need to put a bit more work into
structuring the fire. Check out the above video from Howcast
to see it in action, or follow along with the steps below.
Make sure you're away from trees, bushes, or anything that
burns. You don't want to be starting any forest fires. Also, if
you're at a campsite, double-check that fires are permitted in
the area.
Build a small fire pit. To protect the wood from falling apart
into the area where you're sitting, dig a small hole and
surround it with rocks. If your campsite already has a fire pit (or you've built a backyard one yourself), you can obviously skip this
step.
Put some tinder in the center of your fire pit. Remember, tinder are the small sticks, twigs, and leaves you're going to use to get your
fire burning, so the easier it burns, the better.
Stack your kindling on top of the tinder in a "teepee" structure. Make sure to
leave an opening on the side you're going to light. In general, you'll want more
wood on the downwind side so you can shield people on that side of the fire.
At this point, you have a fire-ready structure. You can build this as big as you
want (be careful!), and the structure doesn't matter as much. Some people like
to build large teepees with their bigger logs, while others like to build a square
structure around their small teepee. Generally, the square "log cabin" structure
is better for letting out heat, but a teepee is easier to make into a large
bonfire.
Light your fire. Grab your matches and light the tinder. It helps to light it in a
few different places to get it burning faster. Note that you may need to add
more tinder if the kindling takes a while to catch fire. As the fire burns, you can
gradually make it larger by adding larger and larger sticks.
That's it! You should have a roaring campfire in no time, and if you've
remembered to save a few of those sticks, you can get your 'mallow roasting
on. Be sure to put out your fire completely when you're done!