Bug Out Boat Survival

Preparedness Brings Peace of Mind. “Magnificent!” Sam thought with a self-confident congratulatory wry smile as he looked over at the power pole next to his house that had his fully loaded self sustaining Tetra-POD boat securely chained up to it. At first glance it looked something like an ammunition carrier on an old military jeep or a clamshell camper maybe. But it wasn’t either; it was his survival trailer, his recreational boat, his camping gear hauler and now it was his glorious bug out transportation. Taking the Pod on trips to where the road ends and the fun begins was great and having people ask “what is that? How does it work?” accompanied with their admiring shrieks of “Cool!” was part of its mystique and charm Sam loved. He sure was proud of the Tetra Pod and he remembered fondly all the great fun times that he and Lori had spent using it in one of its three unique configurations before the solar storm took the grid down and put society into one bodacious tailspin. Recreation was the Pod’s main role before the collapse when they used it to securely contain all their various camping and fishing gear. It was kept loaded for instant hook up to the van so that they could head out at a moment’s notice to enjoy one their favorite forms of recreation and entertainment at their often heard jubilant holler of “let’s take a Road Trip!” Besides Lori and Sam utilizing it regularly for all sorts of water sports and camping, it also came in handy for gardening chores like carrying bags of dirt and mulch from the big box store and for firewood hauling from the woods. The trailer dump feature was really handy. It occasionally became an integral part of their prepper survivalist hobby to figure out how to outfit it as a bug out trailer for long term survival. It also often times lent itself as a ideal base and container for a mad scientist inspired alternative solar energy project of sorts in their prepper plans for avoiding trouble and preparing for an apocalyptic disaster like the one they were experiencing now. Simply put it could be pretty much turned into or rigged up for whatever their imaginations desired for use grid up or grid down. It was a great capability and preparedness enhancer on the road or in the water. There weren’t too many weekends that went by during spring and fall of the year that didn’t find them happily taking it out on a mission somewhere fishing, camping and doing exploring trips all over Alabama and North West Florida. All that knowledge they gained from those excursions would be put to good use now. Now the survival boat trailer served for another purpose, a higher purpose, now it was their life boat, their bug out survival trailer that was packed full of preparedness gear and precious food supplies, as well as their own personal unique water transport to depend on for their long term survival. Owning this durable transformer like boat/heavy duty clamshell trailer would allow them to make their safe retreat to several remote locations that only a boater would be able to get to and that fact alone would hopefully put them out of reach of approximately 90% of the this unprepared and starving population that was becoming worrisome to them... “Won’t be long now and you and me will be out enjoying a hopefully sunny day on a watery southbound highway to the Gulf bugging ourselves out of here and down to the beach.” Sam said to himself as he patted his boat and checked his “Pod’s” chain and gear latch locks to reassure himself once again of their security even though he knew all was well with them. Checking that all the locks were locked and secure on the house and outbuildings had become compulsive to Sam and the Pod got the same treatment. To him the nick name chosen for his watercraft was a simple one to dream up requiring no imagination at all. That nice conversation starter of a green Tetra-POD boat thingy over there under the American flag on his power post was his portable survival pod wasn’t it? No girlie names for it to be considered like Susie Q or some cute nautical names for it he had decided for himself. Nope, he just called it “The Pod.” The name suited it well and referenced all the special things that descriptive name entailed or implied for his and Lori’s survival. ‘Gone, it seemed to him forever long gone now were the times when it wasn’t necessary to be constantly alert and thinking about looking over his shoulder to avoid something or someone that might threaten him or his supplies.“ Sam thought to himself as he first carefully began eying and surveying the woods from left to right in front of him and then sort of crouched himself down a bit to sneak as he hurried towards the path leading down to the muddy trickle of a creek about 300 yards from his back door. As soon as he got his camo clad body about 20 feet off into the wood line proper he then stopped and looked back listening to the woods in its entirety but letting his eyes linger and focused on the house and storage sheds behind him for any clues that something might be amiss before traveling another 20 feet and doing the same careful observation of his back trail for any dangers. Pretty soon as he followed the forest path, being careful not to step on broken branches in the path, he remembered that it was time to be eying his property line to the far right and be looking for any signs or listening for any sounds that would indicate that the neighbors were in their makeshift deer blind hunting or possibly spying on him. That crappy combination of home built and commercial deer stand parts and scrap lumber thing had appeared within about a foot of his property markers a year or two ago and it always miffed him somewhat with its presence. The five acres of wooded land bordering between him and the neighbor’s house who had set up the collection of old boards and junk and called it a deer stand / blind was vacant and undeveloped property. It was said by a few folks living around here that the guy that owned that partial center property was living out of state and that no one had heard from him for some time. That land which was now being used by the neighbors to hunt dangerously close to him wasn’t Sam’s and it wasn’t theirs! The neighbors hadn’t said a word to him about it, not that he ever talked to them ever anyway but they should have been staying their butts over on their own land in his opinion and he felt it was a sneaky trick that disrespected his rights by getting ass up to his property line on land that wasn’t theirs or having any permission to build such a thing. He doubted that anyone was in it today because the deer population had pretty much moved on or had been shot to extinction by the families living up and down this road or they had been taken by Sam using what once was called illegal deer poaching neck snares. “Want to know what is the easiest or best way to fish or hunt in a survival situation? Study what’s illegal in the Fish and Game regulations.” Sam had been noted to say upon occasion. It looked like to him this morning that it was going to pour down rain sometime in the near future but that didn’t help with his current water problem. It had been unusually dry and hot this summer and his garden had not produced well at all, if the truth be told it could be said that if he hadn’t of been working it twice as hard as normal while trying to live off it and tend it every day that it would have likely produced nothing much more than a few tomatoes and some scraggly yellow squash until the bugs or powdery mildew got it this season. It had been a rough one trying to make a crop because bugs and diseases as well as the drought fought him all the way. His green beans grew well as usual this year though, get them planted in early and keeping them picked was the key. You just can’t beat Contender beans he congratulated himself for having chosen this particular variety of bean and for having plenty of seed on hand for his garden staple that he always seemed to have had luck with growing, no matter what. He was thankful that he had enough snap beans to eat fresh during the season almost daily and he managed to put up and can some. He had even had surplus enough to let some of them go to seed for next year’s planting after the third big garden harvest of them instead of replanting. It pained him no end to have to think about leaving all the raised veggie patch beds he and Lori had constructed and so carefully nurtured and built up the soil in for years so they would be productive. Sam began to think wistfully about if anyone was going to ever raise a garden again here after he left. He had been adding dirt to, nurturing, amending and building up the awful played out infertile soil he had started with about 6 years ago. He had a lot of sweat equity in this garden from all the hard work, time, and money they had invested into this garden that you really couldn’t see unless it was during growing season and the results then became apparent in lush healthy plants. ‘Course if you try growing stuff in a drought during a heat wave with no water and very little rain, it doesn’t much matter what kind of dirt you start with, the garden is going to wither and be insect prone. Such was their luck this year. Hauling water by hand from the couple inches that remained slowly trickling in the creek turned into an unbelievable ordeal that he and Lori had eventually just given up on. Hauling water for the house daily needs was bad enough chore; a thirsty garden was just too much extra work to contend with on a regular basis when they had other tasks to see to completing, too. Doing any of those tasks had their bodies sweating out pints of water that needed replenishing in the hot Alabama sun. It was a relentless cycle of water conservation and need no matter what they were doing and the creek was drying up. No, Sam figured it was high time for him and Lori to jump this sinking ship and leave this place now. No sense beating a dead horse as the saying goes to try to get it to pull the wagon. People were getting awfully squirrelly and the food was running out quicker than it could be found or produced. Sam and Lori had done pretty good with their regular routine of surviving without house electrical 110 volt outlet power the first few weeks after the grid went down. It was just like another season to them of getting by after a hurricane and a walk in the park for him and his neighbors who were used to being without power for a few weeks or more after such disasters. They were well seasoned as to ways of overcoming what was considered then small hardships until the power went back on, but this was different. You knew it wasn’t coming back on for months, if ever. The water being shutoff was the big thing. Week three he had heard from pretty much everyone that Sam knew around here asking his advice as a known “Prepper” in the community about what did he think about this disaster and what they could do to help themselves get through it. A couple people that had come by had even jokingly mentioned that they were very careful not to surprise him coming around without announcing themselves loudly first for fear of being shot by him. A few in the community wrongly considered him the trigger happy Rambo type. Sam kind of expected this kind of crap out of the unprepared and had already picked a few chosen barbed vocal responses to store up for such supposedly innocuous questions or kidding him about alleged armament like him saying “It’s not shooting time yet” and “it’s not me you got to worry about” alleging he had some imaginary defenders or help staying with him that they were not aware of. Prepping, by way of a fast definition, is the state of being ready to cope with unpredictable events or situations, be ready to respond to questions about it comes with the territory. ––––––––