Archive for BOL - Bug Out Location
Mar
01
Bug in or bug out? – That is the question!
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We have to quit meeting this way, people are going to begin to think we all have to much time on our hands… Oh well, Monday again and we can watch the week unfold before our eyes… It’s really the togetherness here at Preppernation that we’re after anyway, right?
First we have the devastation in Haiti and now round 2 comin at ya from Chile. It kinda makes you wonder what’s next? Earthquakes coming in rapid succession? Remind anyone of the end of book many of us have read? Interesting, if nothing else? Let me encourage everyone to stop for a few minutes one day real soon and check your gear, never know when you could need it!
Nothing for us to do but keep on prepping the best we can for whatever’s coming around the bend next. This leads us into the next topic I wanted to spend a little time on. It’s really an age old question in the survivalist circles… Bugging in or bugging out? What to do, what to do? Let’s take a good look at what exactly this question means…
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I’ve been asked by many readers what my views are for this situation or that? If after reading this I still leave you wondering what my advise would be than by all means send me another email and I’ll personally go through your specific circumstances with you and report the results back so we can all gain from the exercise! However, I think we have 2 distinct camps that 99% of us preppers will fall into fairly easily.
Just to start this off on the right foot, I want you to remember that this, like everything else I post about is just my opinion. We are free to disagree and of course each of you is going to do or not do whatever you think is best!
I guess I’ll start at the beginning, I know that we have the full range of experience levels in the ranks of readers each day. I don’t want to lose anyone by assuming that we are all on the same jumping off point… The question that we have all heard or certainly will hear at some point when we talk to another prepper is – “Are you planning to bug in or bug out?” It really isn’t a complicated question, it can be boiled down to – Are you ideally going to stick it out at your home or run for the hills if and or when the turds start flying?
If each of us stop to think this one question through we should be able to easily determine an answer that will work the majority of the time! Let’s look at “bugging in” first and then we’ll spend a little time discussing the aspects of “bugging out”, you should then be able to tell me which choice is going to be the most helpful in your specific situation.
The idea to bug in would seem to be the more logical one for most people. If you are already in a position to provide for your shelter needs, what could happen to prevent that? While staying put is nowhere near as romantic as chasing across the mountain passes in an attempt to get to the BOL just ahead of martial law or quick to form gangs of mutant zombie bikers. The truth is, if it comes down to a survival situation – the simpler the plan the better.
Almost all of us have a home of some sort currently and as long as it’s still standing, we would probably be better off standing our ground in familiar territory. With the exception of a stocked retreat off in the toolies somewhere, most if not all of our gear is with us at the house. Is it realistic to think you can get all that gear along with everything and everyone else safely to a second location? How about when time is of the essence? I don’t know about your family but just to leave for a weekend at the stocked BOL, my girls take over an hour to get themselves out the door… No stress or anything, just pack an overnight bag and get in the car – over an hour…
Yes, if we HAD TO go we could do it a lot quicker but we aren’t even trying to get the gear from the house loaded or contemplating the thought of not getting to come back for things we might have left behind. It would be a lot simpler to have the primary plan to just hunker down at home.
If you decide to stick it out at the house you can take your long term self-sufficiency plans to a whole new level. Fruit trees and garden space, solar back-up power and on the list will go. Try to do that at old Uncle Joes country place… Oh yeah you could do it but it wouldn’t work to good if Uncle Joe passes on or has to move to an old folks home in town. Country place gets sold and your fruit trees and everything else nailed down goes along to the new owner.
I don’t want to sound depressing about a “Bug Out” plan but it will definitely make a difference if you can live at your retreat full time, even if it’s a house in the city. Is it going to be ideal? No, but seldom will any of us have the luxury of an ideal emergency situation… The home you’re already living in will by nature be your home ground, chances are you know it well.
If you had to find water right now, at someplace other than your kitchen sink, could you do it? I bet you could name 3 or 4 different ponds, lakes, creeks or whatever, right off the top of your head. What about a park nearby to take small game (if you hurry – before the neighbors get there first)… It’s pretty easy to take the kiddo’s there for a – “walk” – most anytime you like, might even happen to notice all those near tame squirrels bouncing happily around while your there… See what I mean?
If you choose to go against the grain, you might just happen to get to know your neighbors. Those same neighbors can be as big an asset as anything you choose to stock up on… Relationships WILL make a big difference if the SHTF, be the like able personality we all know you are now and you could find yourself with a survival group right in our own culdesac. Maybe not but it’s worth a try… (Obviously, OPSEC considerations apply here so please don’t check your brain at the door on this point!)
I have only begun to scrape the surface on what the possibilities are for the prepper who chooses to stay put when the fateful day arrives but it bares consideration, even by those who think they have already made up there mind to head for the hills… I wouldn’t try to change your mind but only to have you be confident you had looked at all your possibilities!
See ya tomorrow and we’ll dig into the other side of this coin and see what we find…
Prepper
Dec
30
Death and Taxes… Hmm?
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Alright, it looks like I pushed a few buttons on the whole TAXES issue? Good! We should all be more than a little pissed about the outright theft of our money. That money has a direct connection to the amount of time we traded to get it. We all live relatively short lives and theft of our money on the scale that the government does it should be a capital crime. Ever heard the phrase – “Time is money”?
I think that phrase would be more accurate if it were turned around – “Money is time”! Last I checked none of have a lot of time to spare! Time is a valuable commodity and it is traditionally treated as a crime to abscond with a persons valuables?
If we all had the opportunity of making one annual tax payment, maybe even on the 15th of April, I believe we would have our country back in short order! I seem to recall a small blip on the historical timeline that had something to do with taxation without representation. Were those particular tax payers be held up for half their earnings? Hmm, a revolution over taxation? Hmm?
Someone is sure to remind me that we’re getting a lot of services in return for our tax money. We often even get to vote on how our tax dollars are assessed. Well, let me relate a little story to all of you on how we Washington State taxpayers are being represented…
A few years ago the voters were given the opportunity to vote on the building of a new baseball stadium for our local team. Much to my surprise, the very “blue state” voters rejected the new stadium by a wide margin… You might think, that would be that – Oh No, not quite! Our politicians decided that the voters must not have been fully informed prior to casting there votes, so they conducted a media campaign and brought the issue before us soft skull-ed citizens again… If I recall correctly the second vote was to reject the new stadium by an even larger margin?
Who knew – the voters didn’t want to pay for a new stadium? Certainly, that would be the end of it! Oh No, not quite! If you aren’t familiar with Washington State sports arenas, let me explain – we didn’t just get to build one stadium, we got to build two… In the politicians infinite wisdom, they decided that we voters just couldn’t see what was in our own best interests, besides if we didn’t build the stadiums, we would lose our teams!
I think you can see what I’m driving at here so I’ll let this drop… Sorry, I just have to relate one more thing… We, Seattle, already had a Stadium! Anyone remember the KING DOME? Yes that giant concrete domed monstrosity, we had to destroy that stadium to make room for the new ones! One issue though – we hadn’t finished paying for the King Dome yet! We still had a measly 20 more years worth of payments. No biggie, this is all just tax money, right! Tax money that we have already agreed represents a big piece of our lives… I’m not bitter, really I’m not – just disillusioned!
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I digress, I really was going to run an idea past all of you and see if I could get some reader feedback… With all of the talk we’ve been doing lately on our foundational systems, I wanted to move a project up the priority list for a small solar electric system at the BOL.
I currently have a couple of UniSolar 64 Watt solar panels stashed away, just waiting to be utilized. I also have the (3) 12 volt deep cycle batteries that were previously installed in our fifth wheel. A charge controller, conduit and some wire would still have to be purchased but the big ticket items are already here.
As far as the amp hour storage and other specs on the batteries, I can’t be sure until I get a look at them next time I go to the BOL. The panels would put out 128 watts per hour at the maximum. Being conservative, I would only plan to average 3-4 hours a day of good sun exposure. I was thinking that a safe estimate would be 50% efficiency for 3 hours a day to total, 192 watts of usable power each day. I would rather be off to the low side and end up with extra watts, rather than not enough power.
So, what I was planning to accomplish with this small system was mostly interior lighting. I have a few calculations done and with a light fixture wired into all of the major rooms or areas of the BOL, I should still have watts to spare. This will of course require that I use the very efficient LED lighting technology.
I’m going to need a light fixture in the kitchen, living room plus both bedrooms and both baths. I think that’s getting off pretty easy! Six light fixtures for an entire home… Yes, a small home, but either way not to bad.
Since this isn’t a big powerful system and I’m not real interested in spending the dollars required for a quality efficient inverter right now, I thought I would wire these lights for 12 volt DC. The LED bulbs have come a long way and are available in many different configurations now. I found some with the traditional “Edison” style twist-in bases that we’re all familiar with from our regular household light bulbs. These bulbs would allow for the use of standard light fixtures with just minimal wiring modifications.
I found several bulbs offered that were advertised as equivalent to a 50-60 watt incandescent in brightness or lumens… The best part is that the LED lights only used 1.5 – 7 watts rather than the 50-60 watts normally required. This is a real windfall and is the central factor that makes this a workable project on such a small scale.
Unless I’m way off in my figures the lights should only be on 4-5 hours a day and not all at the same time. Even with all 6 lights on at the same time and figuring the 7 watt bulbs, I could run them all for 4.5 hours each night and still not quite hit the 192 watts. These lights will not be as bright as what we are currently using but should be adequate for their purpose!
In addition to the lights, I plan to wire in a couple general outlets. These could be used to run a rechargeable battery station, cell phone charger and various pieces of radio equipment we keep for our security setup. If I’m right about having watts left over and as conservative as I am, I should be. I think it wouldn’t be out of the question to run a laptop computer and even a TV/DVD combo unit from time to time as well.
My plan is to get the solar panels positioned properly but also trying to keep them as close to the center of the house as I can. This positioning would allow me to only have to run the 12 volt wiring half the distance of the house in either direction. Even though I won’t be asking the county building permit office for their permission, I will build this at least to code if not better. All wiring will be run in the proper conduit and done in a permanent fashion. I want this to be a real asset for us in the long run, with expandability in mind too!
Well? Will this work? I’m sure we’re all a lot alike and I know I often miss things, usually small details but sometimes the big stuff too… What am I missing? I calculated out the total remaining costs that I’ll have to get this done but like I said the big items, batteries and panels are already there. I do plan to photo document the entire project and will definitely give you an after action debriefing. If you see something I’m forgetting, please speak up as I’d like to get this up and operational ASAP… Thanks!
Prepper
Nov
02
City Mouse or Country Mouse?
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The Leaves are changing at the BOL
I’m back from the BOL and happy to be back doing the desk jockey act again this week… No, not really, I’m back but not to happy about the desk cuff I get to wear… It only makes it a little better to be the boss, but not much! We enjoyed the time at the country place, as we always do! We didn’t work on any projects this weekend, kinda just took it easy. The weather is growing brisk but the skies are still blue. All of you guys reading in western Washington know how valuable a blue sky in November is…
We spent a lot of time just relaxing. Mrs. Prepper and I went scouting around with BOD. We chased some deer and spotted some additional trees that will soon be turned into future firewood. There was an abundance of neighbors out this weekend as well. We say that anytime there is more than one car a day on our network of private roads. Whenever you’re out walking and a neighbor comes driving down the lane, you’re obligated to wave and or stop and gossip for a few minutes. That’s the country network at its finest.
This brings me to the point of today’s post… I’ve described a little about the layout of our BOL land. We can see through the trees when a car goes down the road nearest to us but no one can really see up into our little paradise. We purchased our land because of the way this particular parcel fit into the overall layout of the “subdivision”, for lack of a better description. There are private roads that chris/cross through the old ranch and allow residents to get back into all the hidey holes along the edges. We’re on one of these edges and there’s private roads on 3 sides of us with additional private, non buildable, land on the fourth. These private “roads” are not much more than wide dirt roads with a top layer of gravel. I’ve told you before it isn’t like we’re way out in the sticks by ourselves, we have a neighbor within earshot but not within sight and a handful of them within earshot of a firearm sounding off.
The most peaceful place I can imagine!
This particular parcel was idea for us; it provided the privacy we were looking for. Most of the other parcels inside this old ranch have prominent road frontage. This is viewed as an asset by most as it gives the owner easy access without a long driveway being required but even though we have 3 different roads surrounding us, we had multiple building sites to choose from that aren’t visible from any of them. When I say not visible, I should clarify that means if someone driving down the road were looking for a house or buildings, they wouldn’t see us. However, in the evening or after dark, our porch lights might be seen if someone was looking from the correct angle. Not a big deal right now but we would discontinue their use after an event. I have some ideas for black out shades that we would implement in that situation as well!
Therefore, as you can see, we’ve achieved the privacy we wanted from our country land… or have we… What I’m really trying to describe to you is the differences between the country land and that of what I think is more typical, such as our place in the city. Out in the country we have a sheltered life on our BOL. By sheltered I mean that we’ll only see someone else if we leave our land or if they happen to drive up our driveway… In the city, we have no privacy, we can be seen in 90% of our suburban yard, when we’re outside and anybody might happen to look up and see in our windows if the shades are left open. Its not that I have anything to hide but it isn’t a relaxing feeling to have such a fishbowl like existence.
At our home in the city, we come and go all week long and seldom notice the neighbors, much less speak or wave. They all have busy lives and seem to respect the fact that we do as well… This is all very normal and not viewed as rude or out of the ordinary. Since I’m more outgoing than the average, I’ve discovered many of my neighbor’s names and possibly even a few pieces of trivia about most of them. This is very rare and if I happen to speak to one of the people on our cul-de-sac, they inevitably know little or nothing about the other neighbors? We live virtually on top of one another and rarely know each other’s names?
The most peaceful place I can imagine!
At our home in the city, we come and go all week long and seldom notice the neighbors, much less speak or wave. They all have busy lives and seem to respect the fact that we do as well… This is all very normal and not viewed as rude or out of the ordinary. Since I’m more outgoing than the average, I’ve discovered many of my neighbor’s names and possibly even a few pieces of trivia about most of them. This is very rare and if I happen to speak to one of the people on our cul-de-sac, they inevitably know little or nothing about the other neighbors? We live virtually on top of one another and rarely know each other’s names?
The fruit trees are losing their leaves too
To contrast this, we have 10 acres of land 5 miles outside of an obscure town of 3,000 people in an extremely sparsely populated county in eastern Washington State. All of these things considered, I know everyone on my road by first and last name! To top that, given that I’m an exception by being somewhat outgoing, these people also know my name and often can even remember not only my daughters name but what grade she’s in and where she goes to school, which is in no way local….
There are no secrets out in the country, these neighbors know me better than the people I live on top of back in town do! How can this be, I have a BOL out in the country as this will afford me the privacy to make my preparations and put me and mine in a better situation for when the train finally comes off the track, as we all KNOW it will one day soon. This privacy is an illusion, just as I mention earlier in this post about the country network. Everyone, knows everyone else and we all stop to chat when our paths cross! News spreads whether its good or bad. If I want to keep something to myself, it will require extra diligence and a good cover story.
This isn’t all bad, maybe not bad at all. I see the country folk that I have come to know, as hard working good people. They think more like you and me that nearly anyone you’ll come across in the city. These same people that know what I might have going on in my neck of the woods are also the people that know when something isn’t right. If they consider you a friend, there isn’t such a thing as doing without a tool or an extra set of hands. If someone is poking around on your property they will take it personal and be more than happy to run them off or maybe worse?? Until I can be there, the BOL, on a full time basis, I like the idea of folks knowing what belongs and what doesn’t around my place.
Even if someone comes to check out your latest project while you’re not around, no big deal. That hole you were digging to bury the latest stash of barter goods. Oh, that was just a test hole for a root cellar – If they wonder why you didn’t do the cellar? You hit a rock the size of house… Very believable, they’ve hit that same rock when they were actually putting in their own root cellar! Do you see what I mean? Don’t like the root cellar cover story, than it was an outhouse hole or whatever? The fact is they probably won’t even ask and if the SHTF does come around, you will probably find these same neighbors part of the solution not the problem. Once you’re there full time they’ll respect your privacy and be nothing more than an asset… If, you’ve always dealt with them fairly and with a neighborly spirit!
I’ll conclude with the facts about country land… It’s the best! The city life doesn’t hold a candle to the life that can be achieved in the country… I know it’s not for everyone but I’m certainly going to try it out. Stick around and I’ll share other various things about the country as I discover them!
Prepper
Reminder: We have another book review coming tomorrow and I want everyone to have a shot at getting the book… Make sure all of you that are knew get yourselves subscribed for the email updates, today. Only subscribers have a shot at receiving the book… Just a friendly reminder!
The fruit trees are losing their leaves too
Oct
28
Minor Details
Posted by: | CommentsAlright, first I want to thank the new subscribers that have come in over the last couple days. I want to remind all of you that if you don’t immediately begin receiving your email alerts than please email me. We’re all caught up now and processing the subscribers as they come in. Thanks!
I’m beginning to get a back log of reader questions and I will answer them as quickly as possible but will probably not do more than one of these types of posts per week. I know some folks really like those but others don’t so I’m going to continue to keep the topics revolving. I don’t want anyone to get bored!
One last thing, please continue to tell your friends about “Prepper” Nation. I want to see our community growing and I can’t do it without your help! Also, I asked you all to start watching your local areas for good deals on Mobile Homes and I haven’t had one email on this yet. Just a reminder, keep your eyes peeled for these homes as this could be a real windfall for someone in your area to take advantage of – Thanks!
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I don’t have to tell you that I’m becoming a big fan of these older singlewide mobile homes… I challenge anyone to show me a way to get more for your money? I’ll live up to my end of the bargain and show you all how nice a place like this can be. Other than the limited square footage, I just can’t find a downside for one of these on a property you plan to keep, long term!
With the niceties out of the way, we can get down to business. These older homes SUCK for fit and finish. Cheap cabinets, low end surfaces, limited or sub-standard trim, inside and out. Then there’s the sheetrock, I do like the idea that it is sheetrock on the interior but it’s very thin and I haven’t seen this stuff at Home Depot. There must be an outlet for 1/4 sheetrock but I haven’t tripped over any at the hardware store yet?
Guest bedroom end w/ old trim at old location too
I have a small area around the back door that’s in need of some wall repairs. Just for cosmetics, there isn’t any rot or anything. The previous owner said that his dog tore the hole in the wall? You’ve seen my dog, BOD, she’s the type of dog that you might expect to do something like chew wall board off but not even she would do that?? With the pergo floor already installed, I’m hesitant to start changing the interior around. I want to put in new kitchen cabinets someday but this is low priority since the existing ones still work fine. All things to be taken care of in good time. We’ll tackle one project at a time and eventually get them all done.
Its actually another exterior project I recently completed that I was going to show you today. I’m going to post both before and after photos to better illustrate what I’m referring to.
Living room window near the front door
When we bought the home, you probably even noticed, it had some real funky window trim on it. This wouldn’t even be called trim in my book but it was installed that way so it must have been what the manufacture intended to be trim! This stuff is about as low end as you can get… Little more than cardboard? It lasted 12 years and hadn’t disintegrated so I’m probably exaggerating a bit but this stuff was pretty bad!
We knew all along that this would have to be replaced but it wasn’t until we were doing the prep work before painting that we made the time to remove this stuff. It was stapled up there at the factory and would have probably lasted another 12 years without falling off. It would have just continued to look more shabby year after year. In addition to the cheap material, the manufacture had the trim put up in a way that was suppose to look more elaborate but only looked more cheesy to me. The pattern they chose just screamed MOBILE HOME. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not hoping to fool anyone but would like to put my best foot forward!
Guest Bedroom end w/ new trim
As you know we’ve completed the paint job and are very happy with the new brown color over that awful blue. So, was time to find some appropriate trim and get it reinstalled. I headed off to Home Depot, to see what I could find.
When I got there I discovered a least three different trim board materials to choose from. There was cedar but this wasn’t what I was after. I was going to be painting it and so cedar wouldn’t be the best choice. I found some sort of soft wood that was pre primed. It was pine, I think? This would have been alright, except the wood was warped badly and I would assume only get worse when put back out in the weather. The third choice was a OSB, oriented strand board, product and it was also pre primed. I took a second look at this stuff and it was arrow straight and less expensive than the solid wood…
I went with the OSB. We bought enough to do the project and set out to get it installed. I did a traditional window trim wrap. Straight board across the bottom and then two up the sides. Topping it off with a wider board and cutting angles on the ends for additional character. Not the most creative idea but it works and is much better than its predecessor!
Living room window w/ new trim
Bug in or Bug out? Hitting the Road…
Posted by: Prepper | Comments (4)Hi everyone, I want to start today with an encouragement to all the readers to keep the emails coming! I want to know what you’re thinking and especially what kinds of things you’re facing… Maybe you’re about to start on a project and we could spend the day discussing it or if you have thick enough skin – poke some holes in your idea or just add something you’ve forgotten to consider? I do appreciate all the feed back I’ve been getting but I also want your personal perspectives, I DO NOT have it all figured out and if I give the impression that I do? Just let me say that I am on the same journey that my readers are on and I’m far behind some of you, please share your perspectives and we can all glean from your experiences too!
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Back on track with the topic at hand. So your rig is all loaded and you just pulled out of the driveway… What now? Where are you going? Are you hooking up with another party to caravan? Did you remember to get those short range radios off the charger or were you going to count on the cell towers? Alright CB radio, hmm – I wouldn’t bet those frequencies will be available in an emergency. Not to mention that you don’t need every other vehicle for miles to literally hear you coming. I’m not going to get bogged down in the communication arena right now but it is something you should be thinking about…
For the sake of argument and keeping this topic progressing, I’ll use my BOL as a destination. I’m going to trust all of you with some of my personal bug out plans. Some of you already know me and I know I’ll be meeting more of you as the months go on. These plans though are my personal plans and as thus are only an example. Like most all of this prepping we do, each of us will have customized plans to our exact situations. What we discuss here today is a fair generalization of some things that the road could throw at us just when we are in need of no more surprises.
Since we are using me as an example, I’ll be driving my 3/4 ton pickup w/ canopy and I’ll be followed by my wife in the Jeep. We will each have a 2 way radio as well as a cell phone for back up if they are still working. The radios are kept on chargers all the time and would be grabbed on the way out the door. For the sake of brevity our vehicles will be loaded with the remaining self sufficiency gear from the house along with our Bug Out bags and all the food from the house. Lets just leave it at that so we don’t get to far off track!
Our journey will take us from our current home to our stocked and fairly secure BOL. Our primary route would take us over a mountain pass and could very well be in the middle of winter… What should we expect to find during the time we travel “The Road”? Sounds dramatic but I think we might be surprised to find the highways and byways we all travel everyday to be a much different place during an emergency.
First off, when did we finally hit the road and get this 2 car caravan underway? Did we beat the disasters worst or are we trying to make up for some lost time, putting us out in the thick of evacuation traffic? Is the road going to even be open? Could we be facing a political disaster that would make the likelihood of road blocks higher than blocked roads? Like I said I haven’t got it all figured out but I have spent a good deal of time pondering the possibilities and used these pondering to develop my plans…
As preppers we should always deal with the most likely scenario’s first and work our way out from there. As you know we live our day to day life in the Seattle WA. area and so we need to take a moment to assess the possible troubles our area might face. We have the full range of weather and natural disater possibilities. We are surrounded by military bases of every shape and size. We are blessed to have a variety of large corporations in our region as well. The Boeing Company, Microsoft to name a couple but there are many companies big and small that are contributors to the military and related fields. We have 2 large ports as well as a slew of smaller regional air fields. As you can see we have no shortage of potential targets for legitimate enemy nations or terror attacks.
As I was saying about the idea of a true long term bug out, weather related and or regional disaster would most likely not trigger a reaction as drastic as pulling up stakes to make a run for it. The military strike possibilities have potential and of course the very real possibility we all face of society finally pulling the plug and causing a breakdown on a scale that I would throw in the towel and get moving. What I have come down to when deciding what would put me and the family on the road is most likely a military attack or political breakdown of large proportion. The only other potential for leaving would be financial… If I could no longer support myself and or find gainful employment in the area, I would head for the BOL as a way of preserving my ability to provide for my family long term. This last option would however be more of a matter of just moving away as opposed to “Bugging Out”…
Having identified the reasons that would cause me, personally to be out on the road, I can come to a few conclusions. Nothing can be ruled out but we are going to deal with the more likely challenges first and then go back to figure out some of the long shots.
I’m going to pick this up again tomorrow but I will say that the conclusions I have arrived at for potential issues are relatively few. No one could prepare for every eventuality but I believe I have covered the most likely but I will again encourage you to knock some holes in m plans… I’d rather it was you doing me the favor than deal with that Guardsman one dark night… Oh well, see you tomorrow!
Prepper