"Fifty years into my life journey I realise that; while I love remote wild places and the peoples I meet there, it is in forests that I find the greatest joy. Of all the forests that I have explored, it is the great circumpolar Boreal forest of the North that calls to me most. Here is a landscape where bush knowledge really counts and where experience counts even more. . . This book has been thirty years in the making."
Out on the Land is an absorbing exploration of, and tribute to, the Boreal forest of the North: its landscape, its people, their cultures and skills, the wilderness that embodies it, and its immense beauty. The book is vast in scope and covers every aspect of being in the wilderness in both winter and summer (clothing, kit, skills, cooking, survival), revealing the age-old traditions and techniques, and how to carry them out yourself. It also includes case studies of early explorers, as well as modern-day adventurers who found themselves stranded in the forest and forced to work out a way to survive.
So much more than a bushcraft manual, this book goes deeper, to the traditions and cultures that gave us these skills, as well as focusing on the detail itself. Ray and Lars's practical advice is wound around a deep love for the forest, respect and admiration for the people who live there and sheer enjoyment of the stunning scenery.
Ray Mears is recognised throughout the world as an authority on the subjects of bushcraft and survival. He has also become a household name through his writing and television series, including Tracks, World of Survival, Trips Money Can't Buy with Ewan McGregor, The Real Heroes of Telemark and many more. These programmes have reached out and touched the hearts of everyone, from small children to grandparents. They are enjoyed by many because of Ray's down to earth approach, his obvious love for his subject and the empathy and respect he shows for indigenous peoples and their cultures. Ray has spent his life learning these skills and is truly a master of the subject he calls Wilderness Bushcraft.
Lars Fält is the founder of the Swedish Army Survival School, lectures on survival worldwide, and has written 10 books on wilderness living skills. Lars is an acknowledged authority on bushcraft and survival skills, and for more than twenty years has worked with Ray Mears teaching survival in Arctic Lapland some 200km north of the Arctic Circle.
