How to build a campfire

Campfires are of two types. This kind is called a bonfire. It burns big and tall, and fairly quickly settles down to a quieter bed of coals perfect for toasting marshmallows, which, by the way, you should always toast with a wooden stick. metal hot dog forks get hot and melt through the marshmallow, making it impossible to turn for a nice, even toast.

The secret to this kind of fire is to use a lot of small wood, especially long stuff, like brush. some tall weeds is good. All that Multiflora rose you pulled up over the summer and put into a pile is perfect. Tree trimmings, dead branches. The skinnier, the better.

Start with a nice bundle of tinder, such as crumpled paper, wood shavings, tar paper, waxed paper, and so on. You can do something like tear off the end of a shoe box and fill it generously with stuff that can't help but catch fire and burn with a decent flame for at least a minute. Put it so you can get to the open end after you've piled all the wood over it.

Arrange the wood as steeply above the starter box as you can. It doesn't have to look like a teepee, but use a teepee of long sticks propped around the outside to help hold the pile up. The key is narrow and tall. And small diameter. The branches around the outside should be fairly sturdy, though.

Here's a picture of a finished bonfire pile. The pile in the middle is old grapevines, brambles, some tall weeds we cut down, all nice and dry and crackly. I used some branches that I had trimmed out of some trees to prop it up with.

You can't see it, but I hid something about the size of a shoe box at the bottom that would start the fire remotely. In the dark evening, I would be able to make it look like the fire started all by itself. I'll show how to make one of those devices in a couple posts.

When you ignite a fire like this, the fire very quickly develops an updraft from the combustion. The fire travels up the burnable material rapidly, and the draft carries flames even higher. This pile is about as tall as a person, but the flames can reach twenty feet high. It doesn't stay that big for a long time, and the outside ring of sticks eventually fall across the fire pit. You and the others can poke the fire with them.

Traditionally you are supposed to start a fire with no more than two matches. I've done it that way so many times, I just take a torch to the starting box, or pull the secret string. That way I don't have to worry about the wind blowing out my matches.

Now for sunset and a couple good ghost stories.