I have been "on the side"-to use an old Citizens Band term-on this excellent site for quite a good while now, and really enjoy it a lot. I especially value your writing here a great deal, and wanted to take the time to wish you a great christmas and new year, as I think you are one of the people that makes a real difference to my online outdoors life. Thank you.
PS Have to disagree with you on the earlier thad condemnation of good old Kendal mint-cake though! As a simple emergency high energy ration food it has its neiche place through more than just tradition out on the hill, as a good sound survivl kit food item! A very useful item too, I find, to have with you to give away, if you meet an unprepared diabetic walker out for a hike who needs an emergency expedient sugar fix! I too personally far prefer the Chocolate covered one, then the brown and last the white stuff original! As for that thread there later disintegrating into a free for all advocation of carrying Army Biscuits-Brown I just do not really know! I ALWAYS LIKED THE BISCUITS-FRUIT BETTER-both the original ones and the better tasting newer ration packs variety in the bright mauve metallic wrapper. In our old TA unit, the going rate for swaps I do seem to often recall, to have been about three packs of your biscuit brown to one pack of the preferred biscuits fruit at least! I always tried to brighten poples days by swapping if asked to, to be nice for a start, and likely because I could keep a deal back, as a useful survival kit ration for later useage! Or to give away if others were starving on a long hike out of someplace!
Biscuits brown. The ABs were OK, but anyone with good taste in scran would want the biscuits brown - far more versatile too, able to accompany jam or cheese / pate.
Biscuits Hard tack are now more commonly known as 'Winalot' or Pedigree Petfoods Finest...........Nice when mixed with the powderd milk and left to soak for a week or two!
Cheers all you guys, for the foodie replies there! I saw a packet of Garibaldi biscuits in the local corner shop just earlier, and that was the name of the type of thing that used to be included in the old rat-pack Brit Army 24hr rations GS, as good old biscuits fruit, I recall from my TA days in the Queen's infantry in the early nineties. The other day I was lucky enough to find an unopened pair set of both biscuits brown and biscuits fruit, both leftovers from a rat-pack which I was given last year by survival skills trainer Chris "Grizzly" Caine on my 2 day Trueways Survival School basic skills survival refresher course. Now, these biscuits fruit were much more like a modern supermarket fruit biscuit, with lots of sugar, so they are no longer so dry to the taste with the old Garibaldi style fruit lumps! In fact it has to be said that modern type of ration pack fruit bicuits are really rather nice! Much more than the old ones! Try them, they are easy to spot in their up to date livery, as they are in an awful looking pinkish/red metallic foil packet! I suppose one could keep the bright wrapper, after the foodstuffs are consumed, to use to signal passing aircraft ground-to-air for help maybe! Multiple use survial kit that! They do say that most wilderness rescues are effected by use of an improvised something used as a heliograph, I believe I read someplace a while ago!
Out in the great outdoors I am always one for spreading out my survival kit all over my person, where it can easily be got at in any emergency that might arrise; or any other encountered situations that might well warrant its deployment for use. So I spread it about into pockets, a kind of an improvised belt-order, sort of similar to that which the military wears, and of course some items go into my pack's side pouches and top compartment! I do this religiously so that I can always locate what I wish to instantly, to get it to hand even in the pitch-dark; and in that way if I lose any kit in an emergency then all is not lost at once, all at the same time. I have learned this from army experience and from backcountry wilderness travelling too; not to trust to one thing kept just in one place at any one time. In this way I also pack a little back-up kit too of the very basics in a survival-tin which is one of the older John "Lofty Wiseman" ones from the very excellent BCB company. That though is packed full to the brim, in all available corners, nooks-and-crannies, with various little extras to aid survival, in any situations, if facing the gravest extreme. Same thing with the survival knife in wilderness places, as I am simply not one of the rambo style survival knife affectionados-hollowed out handle knife brigade-with the survival kit all solely contained in the handle! Because if you then lose your knife in a wild country situation, you lose too all your basic little survival kit items at the same time as well!
How do the rest of you guys and girls pack your basic essentials of survival kit these days then?
Hey hi there ID, a very good morning to you, and a happy new year wish to you too! So you are a bit of a dedicated night owl too then yeah! Glad I am not the only one!! Thanks for kicking off the survival kit thread input again for me!
Strangely, not being in the military any more (now a full-time, fat civvie bas***d thanks) I don't feel the need to do everything Pusser's way. So, spare rats, survival bag, headtorch & whistle. I'm not going to lose my bergan in a crash move or have it left in a cache that I can't get to, so my kit goes in there. Besides, not enough decent pockets in a Montane pertex windproof top.
I just keep all the important/ emergency stuff that I may require quickly or in an emergency in either the top pocket or side pocket of my sack. I prefer to keep it all in the same place and preferably in a removable lid or side pouch. Some sacks (many berghhaus ones) have removable side pockets or a lid that can turn into a bum bag or mini day sack. These are great for a civy user especially if you base camp or want to ditch the main sack for some climbing/ scrambling etc but still require to take a few emergenct bits with you.
Kendal mint cake should be left where it came from unless you really want something you won't be tempted to eat till you are dying of starvation I prefer lots of small bars or individual sweets rather than one big bar.
Biscuit browns are dog food, but then dogfood will keep you going if necessary. Get some oat cakes instead.
The newer ration pack are actually pretty good. The only problem is the weight.
Still all good advice really, you need to make sure you are prepared without compromising the enjoyment of walking. Spare hat, gloves (and waterproof ones), belay jacket, bivi bag are all things that don't take up much space or give much extra weight for winter. We probably all carry spare food all year round so its just the extra winter gear, crampons, axe and I carry a confidence rope when with a couple of friends just in case.
The best advise is if its carried, you MUST know how to use it.
...Trevor D Gamble, or Ted "MARVEL" Borg as it is sometimes anagrammatically known, was a suite of US military software designed to pass a series of Turing Tests. Leaked from a secret MIT military research lab, it has been present in it's current version since December 2007 and has successfully persuaded a large proportion of the online community that it is, indeed, a human forum member.
Of course, the sheer statistical improbability of one human being posting in so many threads simultaneously over a number of years has raised suspicion on more than one occasion. 'Trev', as the software is affectionately known, has responded to these suspicions with a combination of unique turns of phrase that "surely no computer could come up with" and a deep sense of humanity that is, ironically, more human than human...
I am so right about Kendal Mint Cake though 
Damnit! The truth is out there.........
