Armchair bushcraft

[yarrow]

So this guy at work, lets call him K, comes into work today looking really knackered. We get to talking and he admits he has been online till the wee small hours messing about with all his mates on Second Life. It transpires he has made himself a kind of bushcraft camp, complete with tarp and hammock, he has a fire and because there is a river near by he is getting a canoe. He has a rucksac replete with gear. This guy spends quite a bit of his free time on second life, and that’s fine; if it floats his boat good luck to him. Only problem is, as he was telling me all about his bushcraft camp in second life, I began to feel more and more troubled. I finished my cuppa and he finished his fag and we got back to work, but I could not shake the feeling that there was something fundamentally wrong associating bushcraft with Second Life.


Why not go out and sleep under the stars for real? Why not have the heat and smell of a real fire? Why not put a real hammock up and hang out in a real forest? Why have a second life when you can have a real one?


Who knows? Maybe I am getting old! But it gave me food for thought all day. I got to thinking about this forum, for me it’s a place to drop in from time to time see who’s joined and who’s doing what. I can ask about bits of gear I am thinking about getting, not to mention the meeting new people. But how close are we to second life? I know of similar forums where people seem permanently logged on, how many real outdoor skills can you learn from behind a p.c screen? Are “bushcraft” and the internet diametrically opposed concepts?


I was glad when home time came!