Uh so wow talk about gorgeous hey guys how you doing joe here we're out at the fort we're just walking through the snow i can see the fort now it's finally starting to feel and look like the middle of december.

We've got a brisk morning sun's poking out fort's looking spectacular so it's bright and early want to get a bunch of stuff done today at the fort i want to check on it to make sure that it's all holding up from the snow weight fine i got some female bacon you guys know.

What pmeal bacon is i'll show you that oh man a couple other things this is awesome there's some snow in the fort just because of the openings but we'll get rid of it okay well we have to fix our door because there's snow in the fort oh look at the tarp.

Look at the sag on the tarp oh oh my gosh okay we have to work well look this fort did its job over there you know where it's enclosed but we've got a little bit of snow to deal with it's not a big deal and look we have a visitor or a resident depending probably.

More of a residence i would assume little mouse tracks heading under the bed so that's got to be dealt with okay i certainly don't want to dump all that snow into the fort i want to get it out so i might it might be uh me crawling up onto the roof and trying to scoop it out.

I should have brought my shovel next time i'll bring my uh my snow shovel okay yeah this really tells me like the whole thing would be fine except for just this open part we got to deal with that like it certainly works you know i mean like look at the depth of the snow out here we got maybe.

What four or five inches and just the drips that came in and maybe came from the top we're looking at like an inch tops in here so not a big deal we can get rid of it pretty easily  get from here get from here snow get from now.

Pristine pristine up here good job look at that one little piece of liking pretty clean though up there maybe four or five four inches of snow that's probably what's on the ground really still not much snow for this area for this time of year.

Okay so i'm gonna loosen this rope yeah different system for the tarp  okay that's not so bad  okay that works pretty good actually at least the snow slides off of this tarp.

Extremely easy no resistance whatsoever that's a big help and actually i wouldn't even use my shovel up here for fear of puncturing the tarp just gonna get most of it off just so the weight doesn't build up too much  again that's the beauty of the top line.

Hitch right when the snow comes and lands on it instead of it pulling and tightening this and snapping the paracord not the paracord the tarp it just stretches or unstretches all the way there and gets loose and then once i was able to move the snow off and fix it i can just.

Simply tighten it again and leave it like that for next time where the snow will weigh it down and pull it back good as new  okay fire fire put these here last time a little bit of.

Dry snow on them no big deal and i also have some birch bark i left last time i might just have to split down some actual fuel and we'll be ready to go my camera's acting a little funny because the cold i think should be all right okay so today i brought my scout knife.

From adventure store and i haven't used that in a long time there we go the old scout knife so let's use that rabbit trucks here snow down the belly so so there you go there you go it's still not indicative of the amount.

Of snow that we normally would have like this would have been you guys have seen in the past so it's a weird year for sure um i am happy with the progress of the floor and how much snow it kept out i was disappointed when i came and i saw the snow in here i thought maybe if it wasn't blowing sideways at all.

It wouldn't have come in but that's just not the case and it probably fell in from the top too once that got weighed down i'm gonna have to think of another solution for that after but that's not the biggest deal what i really need to do today is um to try to figure out.

How to close this up even temporarily i'll probably end up making that door out of that pallet and putting the plastic up on this wall i'm just gonna get warmed up here for a second and we'll start thanks for all the views on the videos lately super awesome to see.

It's a bit discouraging when you have a million followers and you only get like 100 000 views on a video i know it sounds like it could sound like a lot still but the ratio is way off like um anyways i guess you guys like to see the fork and i like to be here too i just um i don't want to bore you guys.

With just coming to the fort that's why the last video was somewhere else and i don't want to get burnt out before it either you know what i mean four videos in a row went away now we're back next video probably somewhere else break up a little bit more but uh yeah getting this place winter ready.

Was the big job for this year and it's still not done okay i'm gonna stop talking let's do it  she's a vegan oh my goodness holy smokes what was i thinking 16 by 20. we'll have that fire going all day long.

Today too okay scratch that idea of working inside the fort there's not nearly enough room so this is quartered up this is four times smaller than it normally is and we're gonna plop the door on give her the old wrapsie-poo the old yeah.

This will work this will work and now i don't know if it having it quadrupled up will help with the insulation at all i'm not gonna say it will but it's gotta be better than one wall so tarp right look at that see a perfect.

Fit i just built a super slippery toboggan uh i think what i might do is just tie some two three four canadian jams all the way up we'll see but uh that's what it's looking like right now and that way the tarp doesn't get ruined at all i don't have to put any holes in it oh.

Slick check this out i think i can just  yeah just tuck it in the top i don't know about the bottom it's pretty short on the bottom but still so it's not like all loosey-goosey and i don't really have to figure out a way to.

Uh secure the top that way there's a middle post here so i can't go all the way but that's pretty good guys it's better than i had expected  my hands are cold okay i'm gonna go warm my hands up and come back to this in a second.

Oh man oh yes this is the perfect length of a fire uh fireplace i'm really happy with this you can see the steam coming right off my knees stevie knees get some real firewood on here it's all just been twigs so far it's nice and hot.

But a whole whole bunch of twigs to keep that going all day long let's put this guy up and uh you know what my tarp is over there let's see if i can split this inside the tarps kind of blocking the chopping station short swing nice.

Old grandma's axe never letting me down okay back to the tarp i have this kevlar uh twine in my backpack so that's what we're using because that's all i can find so basically i'm gonna go that's once around that's twice around with some slack we'll see how that goes.

Okay my hands can't tie knots with big old gloves on it's a good thing we have the fire going i'll just keep running back to it it'll help a lot  yes sir yeah like nobody's business okay i'm gonna do a series of these down.

Down the door the door for my fort it's a four four it was negative 14 celsius on the way in this morning so i'm sure it's warmed up a couple degrees by now though i'm not sure what that is in fern hot good that the line is thin it's easier to fish underneath the uh.

The door  oh that was too long on the other one i try to be conservative on this one okay so we're tying a knot at the end and right behind that knot we're going to tie a loose knot and not close it up.

I'm going to run this line through both or sorry through the loose side constricting it  and because this is kind of slippery i will do a little overhand easy tie off knot i'm going to do two more in the middle okay i'm pretty happy with this.

Worked out easily so so okay i'm gonna prop something else up on that to keep it there but that's pretty good that locks a lot there's definitely stillness to fill it and i.

Imagine i'll get a couple big logs just pop them up here for now but uh oh man there's sparks bouncing off the roof yeah that's gonna work i might even pile snow down at the bottom and keep it in place more but we've got a log to put here in the crack right there.

Okay cool that's something oh don't go there i'm gonna pull this back just for some sunlight and some air it's a little smoky in here see how this will work okay loose there we go.

Not too shabby okay look at some extra light in here so smoke escape some more uh airplane noise coming through perfect the fire needs some fanning i want to make a pot hanger to hang from the top of the fort right above the fire so i'll just use probably a piece of paracord put a top line hitch on it so.

It's adjustable but we want to go get the right piece of wood to attach to that and it'll be probably a piece of maple out here so maybe we'll go hike around the woods and find that how nice is it out here eh it's beautiful.

We're just looking for a fork in a tree small enough where i can deal with it or it won't be too big in the fort well i hecked around all over there and i didn't find what i needed but i did find what might be a suitable piece to at least just block some light coming in but it's already broken.

In a couple spots anyways i do see a maple here might actually even be an aspen we'll go look at it but right next to the fort that has done one of these i'll show you i think i can use something off the top of it so you see this tree where it's broken and then the other piece falls down right there.

There's a ton of twigs right there all a mass of twigs and i bet you out of all of that there's at least a couple usable pot hanger pieces so let's i'm gonna i'm gonna cut that part down at where it forks off on the tree could have been bad could have been bad okay you got her down.

I'm okay with it being pretty thick as it'll hold up to a lot of heat so this piece here you can always cut it shorter so i'll leave it long that can be the hook with the hook going beat oh only no hook on this beat um then this one can go for now.

I'll be careful how i cut it because then this is even thicker on this side when we do this and see what we want to do after now now i have two options i have more than two options but let's go up into making the hook on either side and.

I don't need it too long again we're cutting it long because we can always cut more off okay this can go no need for that i can go even shorter after so there it is i might even be able to use that to wrap around to keep it tied up if i don't want to make a notch it's.

Quite heavy and you know what just looking at the bottom i know that i need to cut the bottom pretty short to where that is to where the hook the fork is because if not it won't the billy can won't it'll hang off the side it won't fit.

Evenly underneath it so i guess that's the decision i'm going to make now if i cut it here put it there that's probably thick enough we'll leave that we'll get rid of this okay see what i mean just right close to the bottom here so that the billy can't can uh fall properly it might even still be too tall.

We'll see fire looks much better now not so flowy and that does fit right underneath so pretty good i wouldn't be able to really remove the lid while it's on here still to check it to see it was boiling so i might just trim it down like half an inch just here but i don't want to go too far.

To compromise the integrity of the strength of it there's where the fire sits let's go right above it with the hanger and figure out just what the heck is going on so if i hang it from this one let's smack in the middle and drop it down boom right there okay.

This thick one here got him got him oh my legs are so very warm so we'll tie this hotline here and at the bottom so we can adjust it both ways if we need to maybe i don't have to tie a top line hitch at the bottom.

We just do it on the one because that can go as far down as that needs to go it's right there and then it can go sorry that's that's way farther than it needs to go then it can go way up so okay maybe i'll tie this on the the branch so i don't have to notch it.

Actually i want to you know make sure that i can tuck it up out of the way when i'm not using it that's not so bad i'm not really gonna walk over here yeah okay go figure something out if that doesn't work all right let's get the uh the water in there and see what it looks.

Like i might retie re-type oh that hangs fine that hangs totally fine nothing wrong with that at all so i can drop it down to the flow or put my hands to the ceiling you know all right that's pretty cool that works it's sturdy it's flat it's all whompus.

But it it lays flat okay cool that's a good bit of coals man i'm gonna make up this other wall sorry this other door and uh maybe then cook up some food i'm getting pretty hungry this is uh bottoms of a big cedar sorry spruce tree cut.

Some limbs off they're nice and dense probably got some resin in them as well so go real good be a nice hot fire for sure and you know what if i didn't even want it i just wanted to keep something warm i don't want to have to cook it or boil it or whatever just a simmer.

And bring it all the way over either side you know just kind of have it residually warm but yeah i'm pretty pretty happy with it that pot hanger it's going to do exactly what i need to do hang pots i moved it to this side to get away from.

The fire like the flames are all on that side of the wood i got this propped up pretty good it wiggles a little bit but it wants to go back to the top wants to go back to the log once it's done it doesn't want to fall got that jammed in.

The slot okay i feel like the plastic is the easiest quickest way to get something up here uh until i figure something out or maybe that's sufficient enough for the winter who knows we'll see so i cut a log pretty light that that styrofoam when i brought back.

Pretty light log i cut it to fit right in here perfectly okay so what i'll do is i'll cut the plastic just longer than this i'll tack it up and i'll have it loose on the bottom i'll tack it to this i'll be able to roll it up and prop it up out of my way as a door.

Or leave it down when i go so let's do that now i got my butter melting for my to start cooking my food  plastic is a little more hard to work with because it's cold right there looks good to me.

The master plastic cutter okay plenty long and plenty wide so we're sitting pretty that's a good amount of butter in there okay this might not look like much to you but it is egg cheese onion.

Salt and pepper and that's going to be my little omelette a little omelette more butter and you know can't have too much butter in your life all right drop it down a touch struck down get your omelette on girl there you go full of old wrap sands today and how you.

Can use them in your daily life that's a good bed of coals wow nice nice brendan wrong now wood okay let's go see how that food's going  it's white.

Okay that looks just like the butter on top actually i might even pour that out we'll see we'll leave it on for a second see what happens this is a great bit of coals the much talked about pea meal bacon it's like ham with cornmeal on it i don't know why they call it p meal.

We're not growing up we call it p meal p meal bacon so i don't know if it's p male p meal i know we call it sorry p male bacon it says p meal bacon save you make baby they can be the bacon again joe the point is it's super good super good flip flip flick your brethren.

There we go that's the spot in there she's hot she's a hot one the far two are not really done the close one is i'm gonna grub that right now oh that's done the cornmeal crisps up real nice i have plans for the other two oh man nice and fluffy look at that.

That's slick that turned out so good not even remotely stuck because the mountain of butter nice oh i'm pleased can you tell i'm pleased with that look at that holy smokes look at that excess amount of butter in there but make a tea up with this water.

The most efficient meal that looks like a omelette bite from timmy's it's a little buttery it's a little buttery you know but we could have cut down about half the butter on that that's slick even better oh look at that that's my sandwich the other one is for eating.

The other piece is for eating this is for makins making bacon with making okay i'd overdid it with the butter i'll give you that wow that is ridiculously good wow i can even taste the pepper in there i.

Put pretty pretty slick why are there so many freaking planes always there might be a little bit of butter in that too looks a little creamy it'll be all right okay well we're gonna finish this up and.

Then continue on the door   oh look at that i messed up on the plastic i could fix it i cut it long right we have an extra over here i packed it i thought it had number i guess not anyways it's not a.

Big deal it'll cover most of it i can take it off as far as coverage like i'm pretty good now let's uh  so  well i guess i can't tack anything there.

Because i'm going to need to roll this up and down unless i just attack something right there let's just see if that works then i'm gone it can stay just like that and trim this up a little bit a little bit better there.

And then this can go  go up there while i'm here so i can have airflow and all that and all of that jazz and then when it's nighttime or when i leave or if it's cold roll it down tight and i guess this is my my door is.

Blocked now so that i'll use the other side or i just come in like this and bring it down so certainly certainly whenever i'm like working or like walking around in here and doing stuff and building or even just being up for the day this is going to be up because that's.

The pain in the butt but i don't want snow in here i just don't i want a dry area i'm not scared of snow but this is the the goal just like the top like when i leave i'll do the top up i'll do this be pretty good because that right there behind you guys.

Is the only open spot for snow now and i can unroll this tarp i forgot that i had this long and rolled up on that log i can roll this lug over past that so i'll have two tarps on top of each other to bear the weight of the snow in this little gap here this is not great this is not great but.

I need it loose so that i can roll it up and down maybe i can attack it here a little bit anyways that's fine let's get this up and out of here and it's temporary you know i don't need this in the summer time okay we're getting enclosed man we're doing.

It pretty close to being done i think there will always be improvements on the fort and additions and things like that but just for the winter proofing i think that part is almost done okay let's get that up i don't even need to.

Affix the plastic to the wood it just stays in there being rolled up pretty cool  bam she ain't going nowhere  man touching that tripod is not very forgiving on the hands in.

The cold i do have my gloves on most of the time but again it's giving dexterity sometimes you just need hands-free i wear gators in the winter time when i don't have tall boots on because i don't like snow going down my boots.

Imagine that so i've had these same ones for a long time maybe i'll move over to the smoke real quick had these for a real long time they're really my only pair i've ever had probably maybe four years five years now i've got them from mec in canada.

Uh in the states it'll probably be rei you can find them at but uh pretty durable they keep the snow out they're pretty handy a little winter tip little winter tip camping tip but for like stuff where you're not gonna be moving around too much nothing beats those big.

Pack boots you know like the the big baffins that come up to here and just look like transformers boots all right well i don't really want to put plastic over here uh in this gap i will well if i have to it's not a big deal but i prefer to put wood so i'm going to go back there in that big log that i've.

Been using that's been laid down i've used all of it except for one piece just at the very end of it now um so i will go cut that and get that over here and see if i can prop it up here just as like a block i'm getting dripped on like crazy that's just because the tarps rolled off where the snow was um.

Anyways okay let's go do that i think i'm done here for today after that that's going to take a lot a lot of work to uh to cut that and get that over here we'll prop it up see how it looks hopefully we'll close we'll close down everything shut it all in maybe we'll.

Prop up a big fire and see if i can get it warm in here or at least somewhat warm warmer than outside it has warmed up though like uh outside the temperature has definitely warmed up from this morning it's probably only like negative five or something like that now.

You know what before i go and do that see this big tree right here it's broken off right there and if that comes down that's hitting the fort right there ports here right so from inside the fort right there it's only prudent and wise to take it.

Down before it comes down and i can also use it uh for blocking up pieces of the forked um from the elements so while i have my big tools here my nan's axe and my my big saw let's take that down clearing around the ground so i don't trip over anything if i need.

To get out of here quick one of my spruce logs there okay so this is you know decent decent-sized round i'm going to make a v-notch probably going to try and drop it right right that way so i'll make a v-notch on this side of it.

With my axe and then i'll come in behind with my saw and make a cut at the hinge oh she's soft yeah this is this would come down any any minute easily i had to go get my gloves so  so.

 a little bit more so okay a little snowy yeah that's about perfect i'm happy with that wow all right so the idea is to go just.

Above where the point is in there the notch probably the hinge maybe right about there she's gonna go real soon one more  yes sir flawless victory these haters oh my god see my hinge.

Worked out all right nice happy with that get this big bruiser back to the fort now it's a little tall  whoa no that works that definitely works this one was much easier to carry.

Okay i have more i have more i can just kind of prop up on the outside to hold them all in but for the now for the really only open spot is here when i have all the plastic done and everything let's drop the uh let's drop the plastic.

Do up the roof crank up the fire see what happens i'm warm already it is actually i swear i'm not exaggerating i'm not lying it is warmer in here than it is out there i can feel the warmth on my face when i come in here the rocks alone have to be radiating a ridiculous.

Amount of heat okay this this is the way i'll have it up if my roof is um intact like if my roof is all set up and not pulled back i can't throw it all the way back because this um this rope stops it i can still do that put it up there but this works just as fine and i kind of like it.

If it stays it stays the first time anyways still open enough where i can walk in no problem and easy to close and not not up on top not that matters  okay pretty protective no gap in here again i could probably stack it there but we're all enclosed guys.

Again only behind you is open  you got the pot hanger tucked away over there just because i can't tuck it up there anymore but that's fine i can even slide that over more if i wanted to but she's ready to deploy baboon no problem up and out of the way there we got.

Our front wall our side walls with the window we got our door our door at the fort a little gap there that's okay no snow came in there not last night or last this past snowfall at least back wall no snow on the bed at all all that completely dry and there there.

Is your only opening that's it and it's really not that open it's still blocked with trees and snow can blow in for sure but not much i've doubled up the tarps this one on this the roof has come over past it's probably goes to here maybe a little bit right to there so that's.

Something anyways a little bit extra protection tires raging  it's pretty happy see what i mean about the tarp looking a little quilty it's a little bit like a quilt i'll put another log in there like i said before.

I'm pretty happy i'm pretty pleased well it's not too smoky at all in here like i said just had probably just had to get going again but i'm comfortable in here again the temperature has gone up i don't know what it is but i'm not cold i'm gonna get packed up and get out of here pretty soon i'm going to let that.

Fire die down hang out for a little bit longer and go i um excuse me i don't know if you guys remember but a while back probably a couple months ago now told you i was working on something pretty cool and uh it's still happening we're still.

Doing it we uh i can't say anything yet but in the new year hopefully near around spring i'll be able to tell you but that's what i have to go take off and do now too it's going to be very cool i promise no jokes all right you guys been awesome lately.

You guys are always awesome but i just really do appreciate the high views it seems like every time around this year around this time i start to pick up in views and interest again i don't know maybe it's because i start coming back doing bushcrafty things or youtube is just.

That's how it is this time of year but uh yeah it's appreciated a big time all right folks you guys have a great day i'll see you next week i'll try to put out two videos next week it's christmas soon and i have a special.

Video coming for christmas eve christmas as well so again have a good day treat people nicely be uh be a help in this world not a hindrance that's what i'm trying to do sometimes it's hard but you can only do your best.

All right folks i will see you soon on another video goodbye