No Tent Solo Camping & Fishing in Remote Wilderness

Hey everyone, Charlie here, and welcome to the interior of New Zealand. For the next two days I'm going to be camping without a tent, fishing from my packraft, cooking wild meats over the fire, and doing everything I can to stay warm. Well it is absolutely freezing right now. It's currently the middle of the day and it's only just one degree, which means it's only going to get colder than that. Well this area is super vast and it's got lots of these patches of trees. I'm going to search around the area for a bit to find a patch of trees that'll work well for tonight. I'm going to need a fire to keep myself warm tonight, so I want to look for firewood as well. The lake is super calm today, it's going to be perfect for fishing. It'd be nice to camp down here by the lake, but I don't have my tent with me, so I'm going to have to go up by the trees. Well I'm back up in this small patch of forest now, and these two trees look like a pretty good spot for a shelter. I'm looking for two trees that I can string some rope between, and some flat ground underneath them. It's right next to all this snow here, and the ground is still super icy, but I'm sure I'll be able to warm it up with a fire. It's really not a conventional shape, but it's going to do a great job of keeping me sheltered and warm tonight. I'm going to stash all my gear into my shelter and then head on down to the lake. I was driving for most of the morning and I've worked up quite an appetite, so before I head out into the lake I'm going to make some lunch. I'm making an absolute staple meal here in New Zealand. We call it a sausage sizzle, and it's really simple. You just cook up your sausages, put them in a piece of bread, and put whatever sauce or toppings you want on top. Most people go with tomato sauce and some cooked onions, but I forgot both today, so I'm just going to have to have it plain. I remember always looking forward to Fridays at school, because that was sausage sizzle day. Even without any toppings, these hit the spot. Oh, those were good. Let's go and do some fishing. Man, I'm lucky the whole lake isn't frozen. There's a very very slight breeze coming through at the minute, and these packrafts really don't do well in open water when there's some wind coming. Although it looks pretty flat, that breeze could pick the packraft up and take me way further away from where I want to be. I think I'll practice and cast from the shore for a bit before I head out into the lake. These little portable electric pumps are so good. It saves me so much energy and so much breath. It means I can pump up my packraft without feeling light-headed. Despite how warm the day looks, it's freezing right now. If I was to fall in this lake, I'd likely get hypothermia really quickly, so the goal is to avoid that today. Well, in this lake we've got both brown trout and rainbow trout. They're not actually native to New Zealand, they were brought in all the way from England, but despite being an invasive species, they're very well protected here. More protected than some natives even. Trout like to be in waters that are around three to six meters deep, and at the center of this lake it's 60 meters deep, so I really don't have to go out that far. But the shorelines aren't very steep, so it's quite hard to catch them from the shore, which is why it's good I've got this packraft, because you're not allowed motorized boats in here at all. It's time to extend the rod and cast. My first catch in seagrass. While I was setting up the rod, I didn't even realize how far I floated to shore, so I'm going to paddle out a the lake. It's called trolling, and it's a good way to catch these trout when you're using a lure. I just got something, but I stopped pulling it in to turn the camera on, and I think I've lost it. Oh my god! Oh my goodness! Okay, well, we are casting back out there. That's that's what you want to see. Hello trout! That was a good size as well. Oh, whoops, a bit of a tangle. Nice one. I got a bite. I'm happy about that. All I had to do is wait for the sun to go away. I'm quite sad the sun's dropped away already, and just without it, my hands are freezing. My core temperature is going to drop with them pretty soon, and I'm quite a long way from where I started. I think I'll cast out a few more times, and then I'll paddle back to shore and get set up for the night. I still have to set up my bed and get a fire going ready to cook dinner, but at the moment I'm just enjoying being out here on the water. Well, I'm super thirsty, but I didn't feel like bringing my whole water bottle on with me, so I just brought a soft flask. The lake water is not actually safe to drink, which is why I've got this filter from Sawyer. It means I can get drinkable water wherever I am. It's really getting cold, so I'm going to do one more cast before I head inside. Sadly not inside, I'm just going back to my shelter. Not looking good. That's a good one. Well, unfortunately I wasn't successful, but it's time to head back to shore. I think I don't need to be too ashamed though, considering this is my first ever time fishing, and the only knowledge I had was from a phone call with my dad last night. I had these gloves, and I completely forgot about them. They've got the index finger and the thumb free because they're designed for fishing. I just need them for warmth right now. It's just absolutely stunning here. The packraft that I have is a river packraft, not a lake packraft. They're pretty similar, but they've got some differences that are quite important. This one has a separate inflatable floor, as well as the lining down below with holes in it. That means water can flow in and out of the floor of the packraft, which is really good for whitewater where you don't want the packraft filling up. But when you're sitting in the lake for a long time, you end up getting very very wet pants. Well, I set up the shelter in a specific way because I'd like to have a fire right here. If I set up a nice wall of rocks and have a fire, it'll work as a heat shield and heat up the inside of my shelter while I'm in it. I expected everything around here to be super wet and frozen, so I brought with me some dry kindling to get the fire started. I've still got to go and get out the saw and cut some more branches though. That will not last me very long. Well, I've just collected a lot of firewood, and I really should be starting the fire, but I've just seen some trout jumping by the shoreline, so I'm going to go down and see if I can catch one. Well, unfortunately that brought me zero fish and purple fingers, so I'm going to go and get that fire started. Wow, it's so cold. Everything's so cold it takes a while to light. Just break up these little sticks. I hope that they'll catch easily. I'm going to get some rocks just in front of here just to protect myself a bit. I just need small ones like this. That's building up really nicely, and even just sitting in here I can really feel the warmth. If there were more rocks around, I'd build up that heat reflector a lot bigger, but I just can't find any more. I want to let this burn for a while, because I want to get a nice bed of coals so I can cook my dinner on it. I think while this starts to burn down, I've got to go and cut some bigger branches. Dead branches like these is what I want. It's nice to see my shelter hasn't caught a blaze. This can be my poking stick. Well, this fire is heating me up so nicely. Well, this fire has done a really good job of heating me up, and it's dried all the ground around me, but I really want to cook some dinner now. It's not a good idea to cook directly over the flames, so I'm going to shift the fire to the side and cook over the coals. These are going to be good. These are wild-caught venison steaks, so I'm going to season them and then put them on the fire. I've just got a mix of some Himalayan salt and some cracked black pepper. To go with my venison steaks, I brought with me a bag of bread dough. It's just such a simple thing to bring with me, and it tastes so good. This is my favorite way to cook the bread dough. You just wrap it around a stick and hold it over the fire. Well, it's time to let the steaks rest. I've got three pieces of venison steak, I've got a fresh piece of pan-fried bread, and for dessert, I've got my mum's baking. It's hard to see, but it's actually got icicles forming on the top of it because of just how cold it's been. I might go and take it and heat it up next to the fire. That'll be warm, ready to go. I also almost forgot the piece of bread that I had cooked on the stick. Venison's usually quite tough, especially the wild-caught ones, because deer are just so lean, especially the ones that have been running around in the mountains. But this is just as tender as any good steak. It's been said before, but not much beats fresh campfire bread. Oh, I'm ready for dessert. Warm oaty caramel slice from my mum. This is my absolute favorite thing that my mum bakes. I've always wanted to eat it in one of my videos, but my long hikes would have just crushed it in my pack. Doing the dishes is not too hard when you're out camping. It is freezing now, and I'd love to be getting into bed, but I've got no water left, so I'm going to head down to the lake to fill it up first. Earlier in the day, I'd sink into this ground, but it's completely frozen now, and water's so cold for my fingers. This is going to suck for a minute. Oh, it's actually quite nice and sheltered under here, and still holding a little bit of warmth from that fire earlier. It's too risky to have the fire still on right there when I've got my sleeping bag right next to it. If I fell asleep with that fire still going, an ember could jump into the sleeping bag and just light this whole thing on fire. I always inflate my pillow so there's just enough squish left. I don't want to be sleeping on a rock. There's no better feeling than putting down booties on when it's super cold outside. Well, you know what? After all of that, I'm actually quite warm. I think it does help that I've got about 15 layers on. I'm going to get to sleep, and I'll see you guys in the morning. Good morning, everyone. It is so busily cold this morning. Even my eyes are cold when I blink. I've been in the sleeping bag for far too long, so I better get up and get this fire started. Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no. Oh, something must have gotten into my food last night. I usually don't have to worry about that at all. I really was not expecting anything to come and grab that. That was my whole breakfast as well. I always bring with me just a little bit of spare food, just in case something like this happens. I've got some Belgian Stroopwafels, and a big bit of baking, and some croissants. I said last night that the oaty slice was my favorite piece of my mum's baking, but it was actually a lie. It's a tie between that and these. They're pretty unique. They're pumpkin and chocolate chip muffins. Now, I'm not normally a fan of pumpkin, but in a muffin, it tastes so, so good. These Stroopwafels are so good when you heat them over the fire. Soft and melted. There goes the red phosphorus. My campfire is so smoky, so I put it on the outside. I don't want it to stink out everything inside the pack. That fire's going up, but you can still see some really hot embers down below. It really doesn't look cold where my campsite was, but right next to it, you can see just how cold it really is here. My packraft froze last night. I want to have one more shot at catching a fish, but first I want to get the packraft back to the car, because that's going to be so annoying. When it's frozen and wet like this, it's not going to pack up very well, so I'm just going to have to haul it like this. Well, about a third of the volume and half of the pack weight yesterday was all of that kindling. Now that I've burnt that all, the pack feels like nothing to carry. I tell you what, last night I ran out of water, and now that I'm by the lake, it'll be a good chance to fill up again. There are a whole bunch of different water filters that you can use, but these gravity filters that Sawyer do are by far the best in my eyes. I can just fill it up wherever I am and let gravity do the work. This area is pretty cool. It was carved out in the last ice age by massive glaciers, and all of the sediment that the glaciers left at the bottom ended up filling up and turning into these big lakes. There seems to be a much bigger drop-off in the lake just down there, so I think this might be a good place to cast. That's three catches and three bits of weed. Oh, I've lost my lure. I think that's the end of my fishing attempts. I saw some trout jumping off in the center of the lake, but clearly I'm not good enough to catch them. They were just taunting me by jumping around. At least I'm closer to the car now. Thank you guys so much for watching this video, and if you want to see me check out more awesome places like this, feel free to subscribe and check out my other videos.