Making a campfire that lasts...

[MagdalenaP]

We all know to pack in our wood stoves tight to get a long burn, so I'm going to do that with a campfire...any other ideas to make an outdoor campfire last a long time?

We go to provincial parks (Canada) and sometimes the wood is not only pricey, but very green or wet too.Note: Cannot bring rocks. Pictured is what most firepits look like.

Thank you in advance.

 

[begreen]

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[begreen]

Top-down burn will last longer.

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[paulnlee]

Watch "Naked And Afraid" they seem to keep them going all night

 

[EODMSgt]

A friend of mine makes the Swedish fire logs out of hemlock and spruce blowdowns. Seems like a lot of work but up front but they do burn all night. He makes a bunch at a time so they have time to dry. Heck, you can bring a bunch of premade ones and use them as camp stools until you're ready to burn them. There are different options to cook over them as well.

Swedish Log Stove One Log Camp Stove Swedish Torch - Etsy

This Camping item by MetalTradeSolutions has 1009 favorites from Etsy shoppers. Ships from Winsted, MN. Listed on Jul 19, 2024

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[Sawset]

There was one time camping, where the fire ring supplied was typical, except that it had no air holes on the sides. We inserted our wood supply vertically, as tight as we could, and lit it with a fire starter. A 20in tall by 2ft dia wad of sticks. Over time, I noticed that there were very little flames, and commented that a pan of beans will take forever to warm up. Pan on, sit back, they were smoking hot in about 10 seconds. Hmm. Odd. Next morning we woke to the strangest thing. The entire supply of splits were completely intact, as we left them the night before. All glowing, blue flames, mostly very hot charcoal at that point. I expected a small pile of ash at the bottom, not at all. It’s tough to duplicate, since we usually want a real campfire, you know, like, with flames and all.

 

[Zack R]

Just like a stove - build a good size fire from the beginning and then enjoy the lasting heat and limited smoke from the coals. I see a lot of people limp along a small smoky campfire to "conserve" wood and the whole experience isn't great (not much heat, lots of smoke, adding one stick of wood at a time).