Syracuse.com - Women in Nature Outdoor Skills Workshop ignites interest in wilderness

[HuntingNY-News]

This is what makes WIN wonderful. It offers a variety of outdoors activities, from shotgun shooting to nature journaling, and therefore brings together women who are different in many ways but all appreciative of the outdoors.

Chris Dougherty, left , a wilderness survival expert, gives Kate Collins, The Post-Standard's entertainment manager, a lesson in starting a fire using primitive tools at the Women in Nature Outdoors Skills program at the Otisco Rod and Gun ClubDavid Figura 

Where there is smoke, there is fire.

Eventually.

But first, you may have to kneel on the ground with a fit young man as he yells "faster, harder, harder, faster." Under glaring daylight. In front of several dozen other women. As they capture it all on iPhones.

This is what happened to me last Saturday while participating in the Women in Nature (WIN) Outdoor Skills Workshop.

But let's not start with flames and begin instead with Intro to Firearms, my first class on Saturday. When I registered for WIN in March, I wanted to overcome my fear of guns. Since to conquer fear is to confront it, I signed up for the class thinking I'd shoot a gun. But soon, I realized there's nothing wrong with fear, so I was relieved when I walked in and was informed that we wouldn't be handling firearms, much less shooting them. But my time wasn't wasted in Intro to Firearms, as I learned the difference between a rifle and a shotgun. And while the instructor's parting words were "buying a .22 is a great place to start," I'm now certain that I will not be purchasing any firearms. Ever.

Next, over to Otisco Lake for Birding Basics. The ornithologist leading the session was impressive, able to distinguish a single call from the ambient noise surrounding us: other birds, passing cars, and fellow participants, some whom lacked the ability to keep silent for more than six seconds. Surprisingly, I wasn't among them; I was enthralled by the birds' singing and calling, which I learned are two different things. As we followed the bird sounds, we spied robins and grackles, swallows building a nest, a wood duck, and a kingfisher diving towards unlucky prey. I could have continued birding all day, but soon it was time for lunch.

Following a meal of 'wild game and fish,' there were demonstrations throughout the grounds. This where I encountered a ruggedly handsome Adirondack survivalist who could start a fire with nothing but twigs, twine, and nose grease, which is plentiful after a few days sans proper showering in the wilderness. Yet after several attempts at combustion, his lumberjack-like arms began to tire and he sheepishly asked for assistance.

I volunteered.

On my knees and facing him, I grabbed one end of the twine-strung twig.

"Go slow 'til we get the rhythm," he instructed.

I obliged.

Grey smoke rose and his tone changed.

"Faster, harder," he commanded, "harder, faster."

I tried to keep up, but soon dropped my end of the twig.

We tried a several more times but our rhythm was flawed and there were no sparks. The women recording the comically perverse scene on their iPhones were unsettling, so I left him alone to ignite his own flame, which at long last he did.

Finally, my last class of the day: Campfire Cooking. Just as there's different ways of camping - backpacking (my way) versus car camping (not my way) - there's different ways of campfire cooking also. This way involved pineapple cake mix, a tube of crescent rolls, and jars of chocolate sauce and maraschino cherries; impractical provisions for backpacking. But like Intro to Firearms, I gained useful knowledge in this class as well, the proper care of cast iron cookware. Not that I'm planning to toss my cast iron skillet into my backpack for my next adventure.

In reflecting upon WIN, my most valuable lesson was garnered not from the classes or from trying to spark a flame with the Firestarter of the Adirondacks, but while in the lunch line. Standing next to me was another nature-loving woman, but not an organic-food-aisle, chai-tea-drinking, Subaru Forester-driving, nature-lover like myself. This woman wore camouflage and owned a crossbow. She wasn't afraid of guns. This is what makes WIN wonderful. Free of cost and open to all women, it offers a variety of outdoors activities, from shotgun shooting to nature journaling, and therefore brings together women who are different in many ways but all appreciative of the outdoors. It gives all women the opportunity to try anything that them gets them outside.

And maybe next time, we women can start our own fire.

Kate Collins is Entertainment Manager for syracuse.com | The Post-Standard

View the full article on The Syracuse Outdoors Blog