A GORP Content Partner Adapted from Leave No Trace by Will Harmon

Leave No Trace Choosing a Campsite and Building a Fire

Most backcountry campsites were carved out of the landscape not by work crews with saws and shovels, but by sheer dint of their popularity.

Anyone, it seems, can recognize a good campsite: level, well-drained ground; shelter from wind and weather; access to clean water; and, with any luck, pleasant scenery. In heavily visited areas, weary travelers add one more criterion to the list— availability.

These same traits come to play in choosing a good no-trace campsite, but from a slightly different angle. Convenience matters less than damage control. Level, well-drained ground may offer a good night's sleep, but it also requires no "engineering" (such as trenches to drain runoff away from the tent), and it is less vulnerable to erosion. Similarly, access to clean water is crucial for drinking and cooking. But put the emphasis on "clean" rather than "access." After all, what good is access if the water is polluted? The key to keeping a stream or lake free of contamination is to camp well away from it— at least 200 feet from the water's edge.

When you can't decide whether to use a site, look at the site piece by piece. (Leave plenty of time for this at the end of the day— fatigue or running out of daylight are poor reasons for choosing a campsite.)

1. Has the site been used before? Heavily, moderately, lightly, or not at all?
2. How trample-resistant are the soil and plants? Are durable surfaces— such as sand, gravel, or rock— available?
3. Is there a potential for runoff, erosion, or water contamination?
4. If you want or need a fire, is downed wood abundant?
5. Ask, "When I leave this place, will there be no trace that I camped here?"

In Popular Places
In places with established, well-worn sites, the main objective is to confine tents, foot traffic, and other use to areas already damaged by previous use, and to prevent additional damage.

• Where sites are designated, follow the rules.
• Look for a level, well-drained tent pad at least 200 feet from water, trails, and other campers. It may not be possible to find an existing site that meets all of these criteria (rugged terrain may limit suitable sites), but look around rather than settling on the most convenient site. Pitch your tent on a patch of bare dirt, with the door and likely traffic patterns avoiding areas where plants still have a foothold.
• Stay off lightly used or unofficial sites.
• Camp away from other campers, or position your tent to screen it from neighbors.
• Be quiet in camp.
• Walk with extra care around seedling trees.
• Leave the site better than you found it. Pick up litter. If there is a fire ring, clean it out, leave the rocks in place, and scatter the ashes.

Campfires

For eons a roaring fire was the center of any camp. It provided heat for warmth and cooking, light to work or read by, and a focal point for people to gather around. With the advent of lightweight, efficient cookstoves, many campers now think of campfires as a luxury or emergency tool. Land managers have also adopted this view, banning open fires in the backcountry of many national parks and wilderness areas.

By going without a fire, however, campers also forego a fire's warmth, utility, and charm. Just as one person's vice is another's virtue, there are two sides to every facet of a fire:

• A fire provides heat against night's chill, but it also anchors you to the spot. Several layers of warm, dry clothing allow you to take a moonlit stroll and still retain ample body heat. Fires are also notorious for scorching your face while your backside freezes.
• The fuel for a fire is free for the taking, but the taking is work. Doing without a fire may provide a welcome rest at the end of a hard day on the trail.
• Cooking over an open fire adds flavor, but not all foods are enhanced by the tang of wood smoke. A cookstove is more efficient, offers better heat control, is easier to start regardless of the weather, and won't blacken your pots and pans.
• A campfire's glow is at once cheerful, useful, and reassuring. It illuminates our smiles, the lines on a map, and the shadows that would otherwise engulf camp. Admittedly, the beam from a flashlight lacks a fire's personality, but it's portable, can be aimed precisely, and turns on or off with a snap. For doing chores, a gas or battery lantern outshines any fire, and a two-ounce candle lantern provides plenty of light for cleaning dishes or reading.
• Finally, while wood smoke may be the incense of memory to some folks, the tears in their eyes are most likely due to simple irritation.

When Fire is Appropriate
Despite the advantages of going fireless, nearly everyone feels that primal urge now and then. And even well-prepared, expert backcountry travelers aren't immune to emergencies, when a fire may provide life-saving warmth, hot food, or dry clothes.

The key to building a no-trace campfire is knowing when a fire is appropriate and when it is not. Here are some general guidelines:

• Know and obey local campfire regulations. Pack a stove for cooking.
• Build fires only when it is safe to do so. Do without a fire during dry or windy weather, especially if nearby groundcover and trees are dry. Remember that a single hot ember can set ablaze thousands of acres of wild country. Never leave a fire unattended.
• Build fires only where downed, dead wood is plentiful. Use only sticks that can be broken with your bare hands.
• Do without a fire in environments where plant growth is slow (such as in deserts, above timberline, and on the Arctic tundra).
• If you decide to build a campfire, remember these two objectives:
      1) leave the site as natural and pleasant looking as you found it (or better),
      and
      2) minimize the effects of wood gathering and of the fire itself on local soil, plants, wildlife, and other visitors.
  
• Gather firewood over a wide area, well away from camp. Break sticks only as needed (unused sticks can be scattered to blend in naturally).
• Keep fires small and brief. Conserve nature's supply of downed wood.
• Protect plants, soil, and rocks from the fire's heat by using a fire pan or a mound of sand or mineral soil (see illustrated instructions).
• Leave existing fire rings clean and attractive for other campers.
• When building a fire in a pristine area, do not make a fire ring. Return the site to its natural condition so no one else will find and use it later.

How to Build a No-Trace Fire

In Popular Places
Build the fire in an existing fire ring following the guidelines above. Gather wood from a wide area away from camp. Backcountry campers can play an active role in rehabilitating popular sites by dismantling excess fire rings. Disperse the rocks over a wide area and turn blackened sides down. Leave one ring for each obvious campsite.

In Pristine Places
Choose a level site with as few plants as possible. Never build a fire beneath tree branches or atop surface roots. Also, build at least 10 feet from any large rocks that could be blackened by smoke or cracked from the fire's heat. Avoid sites where rain and runoff could later drain ashes from the fire site into nearby surface water. Gently clean away plant debris that might ignite from errant sparks. Avoid any site that looks like it has been previously used.

In pristine places, there are two ways to build a no-trace fire: on a mound of sand or mineral soil (the rocky layer beneath topsoil), or in a pit. Either way, there's no need to build a rock fire ring.

Mound fires are the best choice in most circumstances because they can be built on a variety of surfaces (in a fire pan, on a large rock, or on a bare patch of ground) and they cause the least amount of disturbance to soil and plants. The fire is built on a 6-inch mound of sand or mineral soil, which insulates the surface underneath from the heat.

To build the mound, scoop up some sand or mineral soil from an inconspicuous place. Good sources are streambanks below the high-water line or holes under the root wads of recently uprooted trees. Carry the material to the fire site in a stuff sack (turned inside out to keep the inside clean). Build the mound in a fire pan if possible. An old pie tin works well, or a sheet of aluminum foil. Even a scrap of flame-retardant canvas, cut from a discarded wall tent, will do the job. Commercial fire pans are also available. On the fire pan, rock, or other surface, shape the sand or mineral soil into a 6-inch mound about 12 inches in diameter. Follow the steps in the illustrations to build a small fire on the mound.

A pit fire is appropriate when a good source of sand or mineral soil is unavailable. Use a small hand trowel to excavate the pit. DO NOT dig in dense plant cover—such upheaval usually kills plants despite all efforts to the contrary.

Special Thanks to Arctic Trek for the photo.

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