EWM Pre-Christmas Camp
Before Christmas European Wilderness Mentors in their third and last year of training are following their own aspirations at our spot on Hermannswerder in Potsdam. This is what we are doing presently: Burning bowls, carving Christmas trees, making nettle string, throwing ancient hunting sticks, making fire with bow drills and pump drills, manufacturing foldable saws (see May 2021 blog), reading animal tracks, playing animal form games not only to keep warm, telling stories, cooking for the whole pack over the open fire and most of all enjoying each other´s presence. AP
Step by step instruction how to carve a Xmas tree
cut a tip to the end of a log with an axe 
flatten edges by pushing the blade to get a cone 
push the blade of axe/ knife in a circle around the cone 
cut out wood from below the cricle line 
cut the chips that won´t come off by pushing the blade into the circle line 
repeat those steps to deepen the cuts 
branches of our tree coming up 
again: cutting from below and pushing along the line to cut chips off 
