Gary and Lanie tending the campfire
Fire Ignition Technology (a.k.a. lighters)
Lighters I’ve used for backpacking and camping. Ronson, Zippo and Bic
I’m sure every backpacker carries a fire steel. I do, and I think I actually used it once just to prove I could. But really? After a hard day’s hiking I can’t be doing with that, and I use my trusty lighter.
As to what lighters we use – we have more disposable Bic lighters than you could shake a hiking pole at. They are inexpensive and just work – even after spending time in the water – I know because I found one in a creek and used it for months until it ran out of gas. Speaking of which, with the Bics you can see how much gas is remaining just tip it on its side and look at the bottom. The only problem with them is that they don’t work well if there is any wind.
For a long time I carried a windproof Zippo lighter, but I was always expecting it to run out of fuel at a crucial point. The Zippo is a classic lighter design and my favorite – I love the satisfying click it makes when you open and close it (I am easily amused and impressed). But it doesn’t work well on its side, which is often how you want to turn your lighter when lighting a campfire.
My next backpacking lighter was a Ronson – with an impressive and bombproof butane jet flame. It was refillable so I could top it off before each trip. The Ronson’s only issues were it weighed as much as a brick, and looked like one too (I exaggerate, but it is heavy).
My current lighter is a Vector Thunderbird Butane Jet flame insert for my Zippo lighter case. I now have all the joys of the wonderful Zippo case, including that satisfying click when you open and close it, but with a scorching jet of butane flame which is very wind resistant. The lighter works on its side and upside down (useful for lighting the Trangia stove), you can see how much gas it has, it is refillable, and it has a piezo ignition. It’s never let me down, no matter how windy it gets. Ginger bought me a brass Zippo lighter, so I now have the butane insert in that case.
I still carry the fire steel, and we have several mini Bics in our emergency packs, but my ‘new’ Zippo is currently my favorite and ‘go-to’ lighter.
For car camping the long reach barbeque lighters are great – they are very weather resistant – we have one that sits outside on our deck; rain and shine, and it just keeps going.
Some people complain that butane lighters don’t work in the cold. Well, in my experience, they do if you keep them in a warm pocket.
Preparing Your Fire
When wild camping we’ll clear the surface litter and even dig down a little way to create a cleared fire pit. We keep the removed soil (and stones – this is the Ozarks) to one side to infill the fire pit the next day. We scour the area for windfalls and cut or break them up into useful lengths. I will admit that we have been known to feed in bigger bits rather than trying to cut them up. On occasion, we will create a fire ring with rocks, but we are careful to disperse the rocks before we go on our way, and make sure that we ‘leave no trace’. When we can we’ll re-use an existing fire ring – though as we tend to bushwhack off-trail a lot it is rare that we are at a place with an existing fire ring.
