Hot Tent Camping in an Appalachian Snow Storm

Much colder air will continue to overspread the region. Stay behind a strong cold front. Significant snowfall is expected across the Laurel Highlands and the higher terrain areas of West Virginia. Light accumulations are expected elsewhere. So there was a snowstorm in the forecast. We're supposed to get some really nasty winter weather tonight, so I figured it'd be a the wood stove. Normally I don't bring this much stuff camping, but I've been waiting for a long time to test out my hot tent in the snowy wilderness, and we're going to find out tonight just how good it is. And I guess I could have taken my backpack off at the campsite, made my life a little easier. Forgot to do that. So it stopped snowing for a little bit, starting back up again. It's supposed to get heavier as the night goes on. Tent's all staked out now, and I just have to put the floor in and the wood stove. There's a piece that goes to this, but you can put the wood stove on top of that with the floor on. I'm just gonna unzip some of the floor because I'm gonna stack some wood here. You can also walk around here without getting the floor all wet. It's really coming down now. Tent's all set up, now let's go find some firewood. There's a fallen tree over here. I'm gonna go cut up, load up some logs into the sled, and fire up the wood stove. We're gonna get nice like this, and one log right in front of it. You can see where it lands. You get some small pieces close to the wood stove so that the heat will dry out the wood. Then when I'm ready to burn it, it'll burn a lot better. Should be plenty for one night, but I still might go cut some more. My pants and my boots are starting to dry out. You can see the steam coming off that firewood. All right, so we're gonna make some beef stew. Sounds really good right about now. So the first thing we need to do is cook the meat a little bit. Just brown the outsides of it. I'll make myself a spatula because I always forget one. I wouldn't be camping if I didn't forget 12 things. Looks good enough. I'm gonna add some sea salt to the beef. It's been a while since I made beef stew. It's one of my favorite meals to eat this time of year. Camping in the winter months, can't beat it. So once it's browned, set the meat aside. I'll just put it on this lid, and I'll cook the vegetables. So in my food bag, we have some onion and carrots chopped up, potatoes, flour. I'm gonna add the onion and carrots. A lot of times I'll use celery too, but didn't have any this time. I'm gonna add some flour to those vegetables now. This is gonna thicken up the stew a little bit, and mix that in real good. I'm gonna add some water now. I'm gonna add some beef bouillon cubes. Now we're gonna put the meat back in there and bring that to a boil. Beef stew seasoning. It is so comfortable in here, even with the door wide open. It's like 70 degrees. This is nice. If I shut the door, it'll heat up in here fast. Gets a little too hot. I'm used to primitive camping. This is, this is more like an Airbnb. Not sure if the camera could pick up that sound or not, but there's a pack of coyotes howling off in the distance. Potatoes. I'll add these now. That smells great. Looks like it stopped snowing for now. Had some flurries. That's about it. Let's check on this stew. That is looking good. That's been simmering for about two hours. I'd say that's about done. This is the worst part of making stew, is waiting for it to cool down before I can eat it. I'm hungry. Wouldn't be winter camping without hot chocolate. So we have a lot of beef stew here, but it's because I'm gonna eat some tomorrow too. This is good. Puff of smoke. Time for some Swiss Miss. Well, I'm gonna eat a little more here and then go to bed. And then the rest of it, I'll put outside. See if I can hang it from that tree, just because I don't want any animals getting to it. I got some line tied to this piece of wood here. We're gonna give it a throw. This should be high enough. Let's get back in that tent. It is cold out here. Some people ask me if I have a problem with animals when I'm camping. Not usually. Sometimes raccoons will give you problems. They'll come take your food if you leave it out. But bears, usually they'll keep their distance. Same with coyotes. They're more afraid of you than you are of them. Still though, you don't want to leave food laying around your campsite. So I got my sleeping pad here that I'm inflating. A little extra insulation in case the fire goes out and gets really cold in here. It doesn't hurt to have a carbon monoxide detector if you're using a hot tent like this. I have the windows open for some ventilation just to be safe. Well, I'm going to bed. I'll see you guys in the morning. I might throw a big log on for overnight. That should last at least for a few hours. Sounds pretty windy out there. Fire went out in the middle of the night. Fire's been out for hours and it's still 55 degrees in here. Still got some hot coals in there. Oh yeah, snowing pretty good now. Well, the snow showed up again. It is cold out here. So I'm gonna go get that beef stew out of the tree and warm it up. I'm gonna have that and I'm gonna make some pancakes. Stew's still there up in the tree. Good. So I'm gonna go cut some about thawed out. Awesome. I'm gonna make some coffee but I'm a little low on water so let me get some snow out here. It takes a lot of snow to get a good amount of water. It's been boiling for about a minute. I just use these K-cups sometimes. Just add it to the hot water. I had to come out here and cool down a little bit. Got my pancake mix. Extra protein pancake mix. I could have added a little more water to that. Pancake is served. Yeah, we'll use this lid as a plate. Works for me. Add a little butter on there. Some people say I eat too much butter. They're probably right. And we're gonna have some bourbon aged maple syrup. And my favorite syrup is made by a local guy that wind chill is brutal. Well unfortunately I have to get out of here. Drive home. Hopefully these mountain roads aren't too bad. All right so I'm gonna make two trips. Maybe three. Let's get out of here. Not even putting that in the bag because I gotta let that dry out later. Brush off some of this snow. Well it's been fun. Thanks for watching and hope you guys enjoyed the video.