Survival Training The Pathfinder Scout Course - A Review, How to be Successful, and Earn that Patch!

welcome back to radio survival and fieldcraft i'm andrew what i have for you guys today is the scout course review from the pathfinder school standby all right guys so welcome back to the fight up here in the midwest somewhere at rhonda slows location but i wanted to get this video out as soon as possible for you guys so you guys could see my review while i was still fresh in my mind of the scout course at the pathfinder school in ohio now what i want to do is discuss the items that i brought as part of the packing list and then maybe some items i wish i would have had or some things i would have traded out i wouldn't go over my clothing the clothing that i wore at the course because that's very important as you're going to see and then we'll talk about some of the deliverables in the course some of the things that you're going to make in the course some of the challenges that are going to be in the course to give you guys a better idea of what to expect in that course if you're so inclined to go to that course in the future and then at the very end i want to give you guys just a few tips and tricks maybe to make your experience at the course if you go that much more enjoyable and get you closer to that patch and get you closer to that successful completion of the course to get you that patch okay so why don't we dive in to my gear i'm going to show you guys what i took and then a few lessons learned and some things i wish i would have brought to the course standby everything you see before you is what i took into the course on the required packing list they're going to be a few things that i'm going to show you here in a few minutes that i was able to recreate at the course or things that i was allowed to take into the course for the purposes of holding as another container or different quarters or cutting items but everything you see right here is what i took into the course i have my clothing minus what i put on my hoodie my shimago my wool cap sitting right here extra socks and gloves i've got my cover material my tarp my wool blanket i've got my main malice pack containers tools and cordage compass headlamp i've got my combustion devices hygiene kit down front and then my notebook and pencils down front all required items for the packing list and you guys have seen that in an earlier video now let's go over these items really quick in groups by the five c's or so and talk about those items and then things i wish i would have had or things that happened in the course that kind of threw a wrench to my plan standby all right guys so i have all my clothing and my cover elements right here for you to see now take note that the clothing besides what i'm wearing has not been washed the reason being is i want you guys to see how dirty that clothing is to it to kind of understand what kind of terrain you're going to be going through it is very thick there it is very thick terrain very muddy terrain half of the training time it was raining or at least wet so you're going to get dirty but i want you guys to see my clothing so you understand how dirty the terrain is and how tough the terrain is going to be now let's start with the boots these are just nike sfs boots these are thin boots they're not very warm but i made up with that by having thicker socks now why i went with lighter boots is because they dry out i know from obviously going to the course before uh the basic course is that the terrain out there the pathfinder school is wet and it's swampy you're gonna get wet i wanted to have thin boots that would dry out easily and then i could wear thicker socks to kind of make up for that insulation and what i did was i had two pairs of socks one i wore one with my rucksack and then at night time i would take off my boots take off my socks dry them next to the fire have my other socks that i would put on to kind of help keep me warm and then in the morning i would just reverse that put on my socks over next to the fire that are all dried out now put on my boots that are all dried out now put my good socks back in my rucksack and then i'm ready to continue movement and do more training okay so that was my game plan going in i saw guys of the course that had heavier thicker boots and it kind of slowed them down it was a little harder to move through the woods and those things stayed wet longer they were they weren't as easy to dry out okay now my pants i just had 511 tactical pants you guys see the mud on these you're gonna get muddy out there down by the beaver creek if you guys ever get down there it is nothing but water and mud and thick tall grass and i think at one point i was walking about knee-high and mud trying to get out of there but you're gonna get dirty so the 511 pants they're okay a little bit thinner material again i heat up a lot when i move so i'm going to go with thinner material and then i can kind of compensate at night to get warm next to a fire with my blanket and my shelter items the 511 pants did really well i still have cuts and stuff on my legs from all the thorn bushes and thickets out there but they held up and i didn't have to repair them during the course so that's a plus i took gloves everybody take gloves if you go to this course just take gloves you should have gloves no matter what to protect your hands the last thing you need is a good cut or scrape on your hands that kind of prevents you from having full dexterity and use of your hands i took just some basic mechanic gloves that covered my hands really well they get wet but they dry out quickly too so i took these to protect my hands and they did fairly well next i had a sonoma flannel top this thing is kind of medium material for thickness but it got tore up out there and so next time i go for the advanced class i'm going to get something thicker as a shirt to wear on top underneath this i had a moisture working t-shirt that wicked the moisture away as i sweated during the day and then it would collect in this this is cotton and polyester i believe 70 30 and the collected the moisture and then just evaporated cooling me off during the day then by the end of the day i was usually pretty dry with this but this thing got cut up it actually tore the sleeve up pretty good if you guys can see that it tore the sleeve up i'll get you a close-up here in a minute but it tore the sleeve up and then on the fly i had to sew my sleeve together while we're doing the land navigation course very quickly and then continue moving but luckily it worked out i'll show you guys how to do that here in a minute but that's the covering item that i wore usually during the day at night time when i wore was this carhartt hoodie being that it was november colder months i knew i wanted something to put on at night that was thick warm and dry and so i had this they let me keep it and i put it in my rucksack on top of my wool blanket and then kept that nice and dry so at night all i had to do was change out my moisture working t-shirt was already dry i could put this car heart on put my shimago around my neck and then my hat back on and i was good to go for the night along with changing out my socks let's take a look at the tarp and the blanket so we have our wool blanket right here this is alpaca warehouse wool blanket it is a queen size i've had it for several years now and finally got to put it to the test out at the pathfinder school and it worked very very well some of the shelter configurations you're going to be sleeping on the ground some of them you're going to be sleeping up off the ground in a suspended shelter the the wool blanket works great with a leaf bed now the tarp the tarp is where we have some issues okay spend the money on a good tarp i bought a cheap tarp because i was thinking that we're probably just going to do some basic lean-to's no i'm going to do suspended shelters and in the middle of the night one night my buddy comes to me we're in teams and so my battle buddy comes to me and i'm at the fire on fire guard and he says hey the tarp split and we're using my tarp as a hammock setup of course and he was trying to sleep apparently at some point in the night he was trying to move around and the tarp just split on him and fell and then we were both sleeping on the ground the rest of the night but splurge on that tarp okay get a good tarp now to give you guys an idea of the tarp so we had the shelter split now you guys will look right here it's split right down the length of one of the seams just maybe an inch or two away and it started at the corner up here let's see if i can straighten this out for you so you guys can see this so it started up here at the seam and went all the way down a good couple of feet until it stopped near mid grommet on one of the lengths and then just kind of stop right there by that point my buddy was already on his on his fourth point of contact outside the shelter and then he came and got me he did this sewing job really quick next to the fire as we changed out i just got my wool blanket rolled up in a nice leaf bed and then went to sleep for my shirt my turn at sleep but he fixed it with bank line and then sewed it all the way up as best he could and then we just used his tarp for all the other suspended shelters that we had to make so definitely definitely splurge on a good tarp and a good cover material for your shelter and don't do what i did and get just kind of a cheap canvas tarp that's water treated and water resistant because something like this could definitely happen if you get a nick in one of the seams it could tear right down the middle so definitely definitely get a good tarp all right let's let's talk about tools real quick now in the uh giant layout i forgot to include the bucksaw blade but you guys may have seen it kind of sitting off screen to the uh my right your left now these are the required tools to take in you had to have an axe of some sort you'd have a knife that met school specifications at least a minimum four inch cutting surface 90 degree spine on the back 1095 high carbon steel and then full tang then we had to have some sort of multi-tool here i just have the leatherman surge that i've used for a while and then a little sheath to carry it in and then the bucksaw blade minimum 21 inches so i decided at the last minute to go ahead and go with the 21 inch buxom blade and that worked out splittedly all right i highly recommend sticking to just the 21 inches or whatever the school packing list says stick to that 21 inches is perfect i was going to go with a 30 inch it meant i would have had to find longer materials better materials and that would have ate up a lot of time so i'm glad i went with the 21 inch and it worked fine throughout the course the axe i took grants force brooks camp hatchet and i haven't cleaned this guy off yet i haven't sharpened any of these knives i have not cleaned anything i want you guys to see kind of the state your equipment will look and be in once you guys complete the course as you go through the course now you notice there's a lot of action that this axe head has seen as part of the course i've used it as a hammer not only as an act to take down trees but i use this thing a lot and the hatchet is the perfect size don't go anything bigger than a hatchet if you don't have to if you're not comfortable with it highly recommend just doing a hatchet 18 inches or so whatever it is for a camp hatchet and then just make sure you give it a good nice edge before you go into the course it worked perfect next i had the knife the more garberg knife worked perfectly for the course uh there were guys there that had um some newfangled knives and then some kind of high dollar items and some of those knives did not hold up well some of them are brand new out of the box let me tell you if you take a knife there that's brand new out of the box it might do well and it might not do well what i noticed is the guys that had knives that looked like they were brand new they saw a lot more chipping on the blade and they saw a lot more of damage to the knife overall and it didn't just it didn't last long in the course because of the amount of abuse the knives were taking this knife my garberg i've had for a year or two now a couple years maybe and i've used it a lot i've sharpened it the point has kind of rounded down a little bit because of the of the use i put this knife through but it worked perfectly and it's still still sharp it hasn't lost much of its edge there were guys there that took new knives i think one guy even broke the tip off of his knife because it was somewhat new and he was probably doing something stupid with like trying to pry okay but the more garber it worked so my next tool was just the leatherman surge i like this tool because i can get to a lot of the items outside which is the one-handed open again i'm a right-hander and a normie so i can get to that all those left-handed freaks out there just kidding anyway surge here i switched out with a super tool and i only used the pliers to pull a few things whether it was quarters for lashing or a nail whatever it was a couple of times i didn't really have to use the pliers that much what i used the most was the small saw i used that for notches for small limbs the only issue i have with the leatherman surge is that there's a small locking device here and as i swing it up it can it all swings together but sometimes that locking device can get stuck as you guys will see right here i can show you and then if i keep going it'll pull the blade out because the blade is simply sitting in there by a joint and so that locking device becomes undone the blade can slip out that's just one thing i don't like about it i wish the it wasn't interchangeable and the saw was actually attached like the knives and the scissors onto the surge just by the joint here and it was just one tool i'd rather have that than interchangeable parts but it worked for me it wasn't too bad all right guys so those are the tools i took to the course no issues okay so let's talk about combustion really quick now the things that are required in the course flint and steel some sort of flint and steel here i just have i actually took the se uh bearing block slash foot and steel and then a piece of shirt that i've had for a little while into the course and then the second thing is a lens now got this five power lens right here from self-reliance outfitters the other things i took into the course uh that they let me keep one was the six inch ferro rod so they let me keep the ferro rod in the course but i never used it never touched it i just kind of sat in my bag and it was there but kind of glad i had it anyway but it wouldn't help me too much because by the end of the course everything we had was soaking wet anyway for fire starting material but i had this and they let me keep it no issues there the other thing i had that i'm glad i took that they let me keep was just a simple tobacco tin or craft tin like this this one is uh roughly you know three and a half inches by maybe two and a half in an inch thick or so and we use this uh to carry all of my items in here minus my ferro rod but i also had it for the purposes of keeping all of the char that i made in the course this is all the char that i made in the course and i just shoved it all in here and put it in here we made it inside of our canteens but i put it in here and wrap tape around it to keep it safe during our final few movements to keep it dry so i can start that flint and steel fire which is a no which is a go no-go criteria at the end of the course so these are the fire items that i took into the course you guys can see not much here if you were a smoker they let you keep a bic lighter to light your cigarettes but that was obviously something that was controlled for all the fire tests and everything and you've got all the graters around you anyway when you're doing this stuff so there's really no point in trying to cheat or attempting to cheat using a lighter and it wouldn't be a real bushcraft and survival anyway but these are the items i took in for my fire components let's talk cordage and containers together really quick because obviously we use cordage for suspended containers and then we use a lot of different cordage in the course for lashings and binding the main piece of cordage you that is required to bring is an entire roll of bank line here you got my entire roll a little bit off the sides a little thinner than when it started used it for a lot of lashings and bindings and different things for shelters for camp craft for bow drills for everything the other piece of quarters that was required was 20 feet of natural rope which i have right here attached to my ladder style pack frame [Applause] you can see we use this as the shoulder straps for our pack frame now other cordage that was not specified in the packing list but i would highly encourage to bring if you go to the course is going to be your quick deploy ridgeline luckily we were able to make quick deploy ridge lines very quickly no pun intended while we were at the course they had a whole roll of 550 cord there for us to use because you're going to need it for your shelters and for your covers and so having that i would just recommend bringing it with you and just having it okay next what we did is some of the lashings you learn like sheer lashing is just lashing two poles together basically and i decided just to create a piece of cordage just hank like this roughly six seven eight feet or so for sheer lashings for bipods and that was enough right there i could just put it in my pocket have some cordage on me for other purposes as well then i had just this uh 550 cord in my back pocket i forgot about that was just in there that i could use for other purposes i like creating a toggle at the end to put inside my canteen and lift up off the fire things of that nature so while we have the bank line we have the natural cordage highly recommend bringing some 550 already in a quick release format and then having a couple different lashings and materials in your pockets for the purposes of lashing at camp craft ready to go containers canteen cup and nesting cup no issues there had a good time with that we made char in this stuff obviously boiled water and all that good stuff for the bush pot now the bush pot i like this bush pot because i have the hand holds on the side one other thing i really liked about this is that i'm the only person that brought this bush pot or a different bush pot to the actual course everybody else had the pathfinder bush pot there so when it came time to find your pot and pack your pot away guys were trying to find lids and trying to find their own pots and guessing which ones were theirs but i had this guy that stood out because he was different and i was able to find my pot and my unique lid for my pot very easily now we used we used the bush pot for boiling water and then for cooking halfway through the course we were given raccoons and raccoons we skinned we quartered cleaned and everything and then cooked in our bush pots and then over the fire for the only meal that we had during the entire course so there was no food other than those raccoons that we got i think on the evening of day two or so so that was the only food we got during the course and we used our bush pots to cook that everything else we did the majority of tasks in our canteen and cup but we used our bush pot to cook and then boil a lot of water and eat out of those are the container and cordage items that i took in the course all right so let's talk about the remainder of the items that i took with me to the course now i've got my little hygiene kit toothbrush toothpaste floss and then some lip balm they let me keep the lip balm even though it's vaseline but i had that lip balm just to keep the uh lip supple you always know a steely eyed killer by the uh suppleness of his lips okay and then i have my head lamp it's got my black diamond 400 right here with spare batteries i've got my mc2 cinto right here and that worked really well for all lane navigation exercises and then a 16 penny nail which is three and a half inch nail got my pencils and then my notebook paper i highly recommend having notebook paper that is uh you're able to form a grid because you're going to be doing a lot of map creating in here and so you'll be drawing maps so i highly recommend having a grid the notebook paper right in the rain that is capable of forming grids and then using pencils i wouldn't go anything other than pencils for the course but i had no issues with any of these items all right so laid out before you are all the tools and different implements that we had to create as part of the course that we were required to carry with us and that were inspectable at the end of the course now the first one i want to discuss was one that was given to us and that is just your solar compass right here this is what we used for navigation using the sun all it is it has a square component on bottom divided up into 24 hours within a circle and then we had the compass face on top the nail sticking out is the gnomon and we use the shadow created by the sun with the gnomon to actually navigate we'll do more on that later but that was given to us and we had it i was just lucky enough to be carrying it the entire time so i brought it home we're allowed to keep it at the end of the course now the tools we had to recreate off the landscape the first one is going to be a mallet now this mallet has seen better days definitely but this is a section of pine along with uh some sections of pine that uh i got for my buck saw as part of our first exercise during our first land navigation exercises we're required to go out and bring back certain lengths and widths of material and then they'll tell you what material to get you need to bring that back and so we created this mount the mallet was the first thing you're supposed to create and then you can create everything else after you have the mallet so i took my buck saw blade wrapped my shimage around the blade because they didn't have the bucks off frame yet cut in around the mallet here to create a shelf and then just baton away what would become my handle and so i'd have this mallet to hammer on the back of my axe or my knife to baton through pieces of wood with that mallet we were able to cut off small sections from the batoning with our knife to create wedges wedges were another tool that we had to create and bring with us then we can move to our buck saw as you can see i've just got three different pieces of pine that were green at the time and are starting to dry out a little bit with two uprights roughly the same size and then a cross section with square notches in the uprights along with a cross section to fit snugly 550 cord around top with my windlass and then my blade in the bottom we whipped around the bottom portion of the buxom blade on both uprights before batoning in with our knife to create the slit where our bucksaw blade would sit and then we pounded in our bucksaw blade put in our little pins at the end and then tightened everything together and put it together to create our buck saw blade and it was actually very easy to put this together given some of the instruction that the uh the school put out with different notches as opposed to creating v-notches or any other type of notches square notches worked really really well and then we were able to manufacture this relatively quickly and then from there we could go on to create the remainder of our tools we had to create six toggles and then a number of stakes we ended up using a lot of stakes so we recreated stakes constantly this is the uh bow and then the bearing block along with the catch from my bow drill now when you get there you're going gonna make a bow drill i think day two or so and you keep that set that you have unless you get an ember and then that set that you create goes right in the fire but i was able to create a bow drill set from dead white pine which all the instructors thought would never work and then i was able to create that ember blow it into flame and i passed the bow drill first time too easy but they let you keep the bow and the bearing block and your catch as part of your kit lastly we had our pack frame that we made ladder style pack frame with square lashings the pack frame is made from green straighter material this has a little bit of bend on it but you only have so much time to gather material come back and then create that tool or that deliverable that they want from you and so here's our pack frame and we used it the last day the last day you were not allowed backpacks we had to use our pack frame to carry everything that was in our backpacks and move out our on our land navigation exercises so typically on the land navigation exercises you're going out to get materials to create all this and then to create your shelters the last exercise we did was uh pretty brutal you had to go out and get a lot of material and i think my partner and i ended up carrying back uh probably 150 200 pounds of materials to include all our gear back with us to camp to create our shelter at the end of that exercise you had to create a flint and steel fire with materials that you had to gather during that land navigation exercise so very difficult process very difficult last exercise but well worth it so these are the items that we created that we had to carry with us at all times to get other items and more materials to manufacture shelters and start fires as part of the course all right guys so i've laid out some of the gear you guys have seen uh what i took to the course talked about the uh wooden tools that are over my shoulder really quick let's stop right here and let's talk about five tips from me for you guys to be successful at the course now the first tip just like with anything in life is mental preparation and mental focus you guys need to be mentally ready to go to this course i didn't drive halfway across the country to go to a course to be treated like i was at some resort i went because i wanted to learn something and i wanted to challenge myself and i was mentally ready to go there i knew i was going to get wet i knew i was going to be tired and hungry and cold i knew it was going to be rough i knew certain things were going to be asked of me with the tasks with the challenges and obstacles in the course and i understood that fortunately being in the military and i've had and have had the advantages that that entails i'm used to a lot of that stuff i'm used to the rigors of tough training some people were not we had i think five four or five people quit the course which is probably a writer out about average for that course but they quit because they couldn't handle the rigors of the course they were out of their element so tip one be mentally prepared do the things you need to before going to the course to be mentally prepared and focused tip number two physical preparation you need to be physically fit as best as you can before you go to the course you need to be physically fit so understand read in the description of the course on the website read what is in that course and understand you're going to be moving over rough terrain through thick terrain a lot of vegetation you're going to be cold tired wet and hungry you need to be physically fit that physical fitness set short goals for yourself short-term goals before you reach that long-term goal if you're not good at rock marching or you're not good at carrying weight on your shoulders and moving through vegetation start now use progressive steps they get to longer distances at faster times with heavier weight and then continue to practice and train all the way up until you get to the course and you're ready to go into the training you need to be physically fit you need to be physically fit all right and physically fit will help you with your mental fitness all right like dick winter said from easy company 101st airborne during world war ii physical fitness is the root of mental toughness tip number three land navigation you need to understand the basics of land navigation you need to understand how to orient a map you need to understand how to read a map you need to understand how to plot a course you need to understand how a protractor works how a compass works you need to understand all those things before you go to the scout class if you go to the basic class you'll probably learn a lot of that stuff and learn some basic land navigation skills but you need to understand land navigation so start studying up on land navigation start studying the basics of land navigation and prepare for advanced levels of land navigation like using the solar compass at the scout class because you're going to do it and then you're going to do paul maps you're going to make your own maps the same way so you need to understand basic land navigation skills before you go there because you're going to see some advanced skills and you're going to have very little time to learn those skills and then execute those skills on a land navigation course so you need to understand the basics of lane navigation tip number four master the basics a lot of the guys that went to the course were at the basics class so they have some of the knowledge that goes into the scout class or intermediate class that will feed it to the advanced class the guy that was my partner in the course did not go to the basics class so i had to teach him the things that were in the basics class and luckily enough he was able to absorb that information and then execute it and then he helped out our team and was able to patch right alongside me but master the basics know the basics before you get there and then i'm guessing now that i'm done with the scout course that i need to master these basics that i learned in the scout course master all those techniques and all those things that we did in the scout course before i even get to the advanced course so i can be that much more prepared but master the basics is tip number four all right guys the last tip i'm going to give you tip number five is move with a sense of purpose move with a sense of purpose okay now at the end of the course everybody was tired hungry wet cold and exhausted got it we're kind of we're kind of moving slow got it you need to move with a sense of purpose in everything you do in life you know i motivated my partner to move with me and he moved with me like a trooper and kept up the entire time during the course i had to teach him a few things and he taught me a couple of things but we motivated each other some guys out there were just moving slow and started to feel sorry for themselves you need to move with a sense of purpose at this course you need to move with a sense of purpose at anything you do in life all right if you don't move with a sense of purpose and you don't exercise that initiative and that discipline that level of internal discipline to actually accomplish something and move yourself you're not going to last very long especially in a survival scenario where you may not have all these tools here you may not have all the packing list items and you have to move with a sense of purpose to recreate a lot of that stuff or recreate something else from the landscape but you have to move with a sense of purpose exercise that as much as you can at the course and anything you do in life especially at the scout course exercise that as much as possible because you're only training yourself to move with a higher level of discipline than you normally do and it's a perfect time to exercise that it will pay off it will pay off in the end especially if you move with a sense of purpose and you realize you forgot something and now you have this extra time to recreate it you know what i mean but move with a sense of purpose guys okay uh so so all right guys that does it for this video if there's a burning question you guys have leave it in the comments section and i'll try to answer it as fast as i can now this is a very down dirty video about the core the scout course at the pathfinder school in ohio i want to get all the information to you guys based on the packing list and some of the deliverables you're going to have as fast as i can while it's still fresh in my mind but if you guys like this video hit that like button hit that subscribe button leave a comment in the comment section make sure you ring that bell in the corner so you guys never miss out on my videos i want to thank you guys for everything you do for me for the channel for all your likes your views your subscriptions your comments your feedback and your shares and i'll be back with another awesome video as soon as i can guys thanks

Channel: Ranger Survival and Field Craft

Views: 40,137

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Id: EQ1oNi2XmUw

Length: 35min 56sec (2156 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 26 2020