WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

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Kip42
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WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by Kip42 »

Where are some places you could go to bug out. I have a cabin but its not all that far out. SEems like going in the woods would be a really bad choice. Where do you guys plan to go for SHTF?
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by JohnnyC »

Your woods may suck, but my woods are great!
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bakerjw
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by bakerjw »

For me the woods are an absolute last resort. We have food and water readily available which makes closing the blinds and laying low a more viable option. We have a defensible perimeter which can be reinforced easily with barbed wire.

A lot of it depends on what kind of shtf scenario happens. The economy collapses and urban zombies flood the countryside? Commander Barky tries to crack down?
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mars
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by mars »

I'd go someplace where I knew the ins and outs. You don't wanna be roaming when the shtf.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by bakerjw »

+1

Tromping in someone elses back yard, aka the wilderness, is a recipe for disaster.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by silencertalk »

I would stay in my house. If that were taken over by zombies, I would go to another house.
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igpoobah
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by igpoobah »

Another vote for bugging in. I live far out, but not too far out.

If my home is destroyed I will live in the shop. If that's gone too I am probably FUBAR. LOL
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stevejobs
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by stevejobs »

mars wrote:I'd go someplace where I knew the ins and outs. You don't wanna be roaming when the shtf.
I concur.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by oilfieldtrash76 »

Im for digging in and defending my home also. Have plenty of supplies and weapons/ammo on hand. Also transportation (vehicles and horses) available. Family and friends nearby for reinforcements if i need it. Just a few of the benefits of living in the country.
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Sigproshooter
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by Sigproshooter »

Sounds like you guys will be contributing to the huge groups of similiar thinking BGs'.

If they want your stuff, they will get in. If you harden your home, they will catch it on fire to get you out.

You will never be able to defend a building with your gear and family against roving hordes of starving scared and newly primal citizens.

I sincerely wish anybody trapped in suburbs or cities the best of luck.
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Crosshair
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by Crosshair »

Sigproshooter wrote:Sounds like you guys will be contributing to the huge groups of similiar thinking BGs'.
As opposed to walking around the woods like a dolt and taking a .270 to the head because you wandered into the sights of someone else who thought that territory looked nice and didn't want competition. Your gear will then be promptly looted and your body burned. There is a reason fending for yourself in the woods died out several thousand years ago.

Woods = Good. City = Bad. Is overly simplistic and totally useless for anyone serious about being prepared. If you live in LA then yea it would probably be best to have an evacuation plan. If you live in Fargo, North Dakota you would probably be best off bugging in in some form.
If they want your stuff, they will get in. If you harden your home, they will catch it on fire to get you out.
Tell that to the armed Korean shop owners in 92. Keep shooting them until they stop coming. Seemed to work well.

Why on earth would they waste time setting fire to your home if they are starving and want your stuff? If they burn it down they won't get anything and have wasted what little resources they still have. The only time you see burning is when you have a mob that is out to have some fun, loot some stuff, and destroy things.

This is also the advantage of having cold winters. Also good to not advertise that you have loads of stuff to begin with too.
You will never be able to defend a building with your gear and family against roving hordes of starving scared and newly primal citizens.
The Koreans in LA seemed to do OK.
I sincerely wish anybody trapped in suburbs or cities the best of luck.
I'm in North Dakota. All the parasites are much farther south. We should do relatively OK. Any breakdown is going to be temporary and society of some form or another is going to come back after a time once the parasites starve to death.
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urban assault
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by urban assault »

I've got a wife and an elderly mother with a bad hip, so any bad guys around here are gonna find me dug in like a very-well armed Alabama tick.

Got 150 gallons of treated water stored up, and pails of dry food too, so with all the canned stuff we have on hand we should be eating for awhile before we'd be forced to get gone.

When that happens, we'd head up to my Dad's place within 30 miles.

Very wooded 80 acres at the end of a really long, winding uphill gravel road, way out in the boonies, with the small handful of neighbors being mostly related to the rest of his wife's family.

On the 80 acres there is a small herd of cattle, some chickens, a large veg. garden, a couple of orchards, a year-round spring and lots of deer, rabbits, quail, etc.

That is going to be the rally point for a few families now because it is very secluded, has plenty of food and water, there is room to spread out, and being that the property is at the end of the road it should be easier to defend if things got that nasty.

I do plan on staying in my home(quietly) as long as possible though.

-urban
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by mx201er »

Call me crazy, but I fully intend to build a small concrete Bunker with a good vault door under my house when I build one in a few years. Store a pallet of mre's in there and have emergency water and supplies :D
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ick
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by ick »

You guys certainly are prepared, pretty impressive. I am a long way from being that "ready" so I admire your preparedness.

I can see that communication is going to be a serious problem if things get really bad, especially if it happens quickly. Add to that the fact that many persons no longer have land-line phones, don't expect to be able to make a call. I expect cell phones to stop working almost immediately. Families better have a detailed contingency plan with meeting locations and times that are clear and "achievable" even if your loved one has to WALK to the meeting point.

For example, if you have a family member, say, 60 miles away in a city at work trying to get out. If they only have a quarter tank of gas.... that is a real problem. Add to that jammed highways clogged with cars, some abandoned... and it is nearly impossible for your loved one to get to you... with no way to communicate their location for YOU to get to them even if you DO have a vehicle that is nimble and have adequate gasoline.

Imagine the stress and pain of a loved one you might not ever see again because they are just a minor 60 miles away, trapped behind hundreds of thousands of hungry, angry, desperate people.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by bakerjw »

My saying is "If you are prepared for 90% of what might go wrong you will at least be better equipped to handle the other 10%."

A good part of planning that Ick has hit upon is to plan out evacuation routes. Direct is not always the best. My son lives 600+ miles away and the quickest route to where I live is all Interstate passing through large metropolitan areas. If Interstates aren't completely shut down by TPTB then they will likely be clogged by motorists or controlled by mobs. Remember the Interstates before Katrina hit? People ran out of gas all over and clogged already congested Interstates.

The safest route would have to be planned out to skirt medium cities altogether and look for immediate alternate routes near bridges and other congestion points.

Also pick up some 5 gallon gas cans for those loved ones at a distance. If they swap out the gas into their car and refill once a month then the lack of gas will not be something to worry about. Safe storage is still a concern however.
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Sigproshooter
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by Sigproshooter »

Crosshair wrote:
Sigproshooter wrote:Sounds like you guys will be contributing to the huge groups of similiar thinking BGs'.
As opposed to walking around the woods like a dolt and taking a .270 to the head because you wandered into the sights of someone else who thought that territory looked nice and didn't want competition. Your gear will then be promptly looted and your body burned. There is a reason fending for yourself in the woods died out several thousand years ago.

Woods = Good. City = Bad. Is overly simplistic and totally useless for anyone serious about being prepared. If you live in LA then yea it would probably be best to have an evacuation plan. If you live in Fargo, North Dakota you would probably be best off bugging in in some form.
If they want your stuff, they will get in. If you harden your home, they will catch it on fire to get you out.
Tell that to the armed Korean shop owners in 92. Keep shooting them until they stop coming. Seemed to work well.

Why on earth would they waste time setting fire to your home if they are starving and want your stuff? If they burn it down they won't get anything and have wasted what little resources they still have. The only time you see burning is when you have a mob that is out to have some fun, loot some stuff, and destroy things.

This is also the advantage of having cold winters. Also good to not advertise that you have loads of stuff to begin with too.
You will never be able to defend a building with your gear and family against roving hordes of starving scared and newly primal citizens.
The Koreans in LA seemed to do OK.
I sincerely wish anybody trapped in suburbs or cities the best of luck.
I'm in North Dakota. All the parasites are much farther south. We should do relatively OK. Any breakdown is going to be temporary and society of some form or another is going to come back after a time once the parasites starve to death.

Think what you wish,, just remember, you will look up just before your newly charring roof collapses.
Regard your soldiers as your children, and they will follow you into the deepest valleys; look on them as your own beloved sons, and they will stand by you even unto death.
Sun Tzu
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urban assault
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by urban assault »

bakerjw wrote:My saying is "If you are prepared for 90% of what might go wrong you will at least be better equipped to handle the other 10%."

A good part of planning that Ick has hit upon is to plan out evacuation routes. Direct is not always the best. My son lives 600+ miles away and the quickest route to where I live is all Interstate passing through large metropolitan areas. If Interstates aren't completely shut down by TPTB then they will likely be clogged by motorists or controlled by mobs. Remember the Interstates before Katrina hit? People ran out of gas all over and clogged already congested Interstates.

The safest route would have to be planned out to skirt medium cities altogether and look for immediate alternate routes near bridges and other congestion points.

Also pick up some 5 gallon gas cans for those loved ones at a distance. If they swap out the gas into their car and refill once a month then the lack of gas will not be something to worry about. Safe storage is still a concern however.
Getting some good quality topographical maps that show railroad grades/tracks, and US forest service roads of the route you have to travel through to get to your BOL would be very useful NOW.

Something else that could prove invaluable, I have this item myself in my BOB, is the tiny GP-4L EFTR 4-band shortwave radio, and the wind-up 16' antenna to increase the radio's recieving range from countycomm.com

http://www.countycomm.com/gp4light.html
http://www.countycomm.com/swantenna.html

If you are on the move to your BOL, possibly on foot, quietly using your topo maps to travel alongside railroad tracks, it would be a great help to be able to tune into to the radio and be alerted to roadblocks, closed areas, forced evac zones, etc. ahead of you.

-urban
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by MD3C »

My best efforts will be to get home. I'm set up so-so but it's home. I've done enough living under a tarp.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by AMProducts »

So funny story, most looters are there to loot, not to die or get shot at. Fire a few shots at them, and they will go find someone else to loot who won't shoot at them.

I will definitely +1 on the idea that a stick frame house is really not a defensible structure, bullets go through them, they do burn, but really houses don't burn that well, the stuff inside them does. Having played the part of the bad guy against a swat team more than once, you will be shot, you may shoot some of them, but you will be shot. That's against a swat team though, not against disorganized opportunistic looters.

Unless the looters happened to be armed with .50cal APIT, trebuchet's shooting firepots, or flaming arrows, your average deer rifle will easily out range the distance even the most determined looter can throw a petrol bomb. Shoot them first, shoot them at distance, and you won't have that many issues.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by Nypto »

I'm a disabled vet and do not like to be around those types of people who want or need others to help them get along. I moved to a 10 acre area away from....people.
I was the 5th house in 2500 acres but now, I am in the middle of over 500 homes. It gripes me to no end that people always want to gather together for the good of the whole. in my experience, when you get a group together someone always wants the group to do what "THEY
say. Always someone who knows how YOU should live better than you do.
They have meetings each month to talk about what they need to do to survive, or make their existence better.

I do NOT want entitlement people anywhere around me. I look at them all as "Dead People Walking" and I have not seen one person that had a good idea as what to do when TSHTF.
Live low,unseen and don't take prisoners. Be nice and tell people (Sheeple). to go away and do not come back. If They come to your place carrying a gun....THEY will leave but without that gun..Dummies.
So many Sheeple will come begging and YOU will be the fool if you give out a single bean. In the END Times when TSHTF you WILL HAVE to become hard hearted and become a savage or YOU will die.It is simple as that. Survive your way and I will survive mine. Survive by being invisible and unheard or smelt. Go foraging and you are in jeopardy of not getting back.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by rogerme »

Bug out? I am bugged out!!
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by bluedragonsblood »

SHTF I would go to my grandpa property out in the country, where several familys and friends will merge in on. That is after we loot the local armory and ammo holding point. With a couple of ex ranger and SF buddys we will set up a deffense perimiter. That is a end of the world senerio.

Your basic civil disterbence, I would hold up in my house with my family. We have enough firepower and ammo, plus the training to defend our house. Also I already have enough water and food to last 30 plus days. My wife and I are both military, and we go regularly to the range and practice reflex fire drills/room clearing drills with my two daughters. Incorperating our personal experinces and lessons learned in Iraq and Afganistan. I feel sorry for the people who attack our house or put my family in danger.
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by trouble »

Depends on what exactly has happened, home is where I'll stay until i can't stay. Then the woods or wherever is where I'll be. Always have a plan B...
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by Homer »

G'Day Fella's,

Some interesting reading there, thank you for that!

I also recently clicked on the "Bosnian Survivalist" thread, which made for some more interesting reading!
Basically the way I read it, he summarized it down to two primary areas "Hygiene and Hardware" (obviously + Food, Water and Shelter and 100+ disposable cigarette lighters)!!!

When you think about it, go back just 150 years, and we didn't have much external Hygiene assistance, and only basic firearms but most all people survived!
But then they did have Common Sense by the bucket load, back then!!!

Doh!
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Re: WHere to go? THe woods is not the best option

Post by ranb »

Crosshair wrote:Tell that to the armed Korean shop owners in 92. Keep shooting them until they stop coming. Seemed to work well.

The Koreans in LA seemed to do OK.
That all depends on how you define "well" or "OK".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1992_Los_A ... -Americans
Korean Americans not only faced physical damages to their stores and community surroundings, but they also suffered emotional and psychological despair. About 2,300 Korean owned stores in Southern California and Koreatown were looted or burned, thus contributing to 45 percent of all damages caused by the riot. According to the Asian and Pacific American Counseling and Prevention Center, 730 Koreans were treated for post-traumatic suffering, which included symptoms such as insomnia, sense of inactivity, and muscle pain. Such physical and psychological trauma created a positive movement as Korean Americans established their political and social empowerment.[48]
They didn't do well at all. But it could have been much worse if they didn't defend themselves.

Ranb
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