BRIDGEPORT - For thousands of U.S. Marines, the road to Afghanistan goes through an isolated training facility in the Eastern Sierra where they share the rugged Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest with civilian hunters, backpackers and skiers.

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Basic Survival Skills -Rigging- Part 2 (Knots, Hitches, and Bends)

This session will be devoted to Knots, both basic and advanced. So if you have not read Part 1 of this series yet, you may want to boogie on overHERE and catch up with the class. The US Army manual FM-3-97 (Mountaineering) has this to say about Knots:

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Basic Survival Skills -Rigging- Part 1 (Terms and Rope)

I am not surprised that the kid across the street did not know how to tie a friggin knot, our societal culture has moved beyond the basic survival level along time ago.

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I'm trying to start a fire. There are four men clustered around me – the survival course leader, his sidekick, a Times photographer, and a famous author. I can't see them. I've forgotten they are there.

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UNLESS John D. McCann, the managing director of Survival Resources, based in Hyde Park, N.Y., is wearing a suit for some sort of business meeting, he always carries in his pants pocket an Altoids tin. There are no mints inside it.

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