I wrote about roll mats in a recent blog citing them as a camping essential. It elicited a response from a nice guy at Trailblaze.com who thought that the food, shelter, warmth etc were in fact the real camping essentials. However, while totally agreeing with this guy, his essentials are suited to survival camping. I was thinking of kit to go camping with mates or with the kids for a weekend.

I still think a roll mat is the one of the best things you can take. Whilst travelling through Canada several years ago, the Rockies had an unseasonably cold and wet Summer (sounds familiar?). I had bought a plain, cheap yellow roll mat along for the trip but was actually suffering a bit at night with the cold seeping through the foam, plus it was a bit too thin to cope with some of the ground we were sleeping on. By some bizarre stroke of luck, I got chatting to a girl who was leaving Canada the next day and needed to ditch her thermarest as she didn’t need it for the next stage of her travels. She offered it to me when she heard me complaining of aching kidneys thanks to the cold seeping up from the ground. The thermarest was amazing to go camping with. I was a changed man. After a full nights’ sleep where I was toasty all night (and comfortable) I soon realised what a difference a thermarest can make. My morale was boosted as I wasn’t dreading the next freezing night out. I still have that same roll mat 15 years on. It has a puncture, doesn’t inflate properly and smells a bit, but I can’t bring myself to throw it away. I know that I’ll have to replace it sooner or later. So, to me a roll mat is an essential to go camping with.

To the survivalists out there, you should know too that you need to protect yourself from cold floors – I seem to recall that Ray Mears recommended a bed of pine branches thick with fronds as ‘nature’s roll mat’. Touché!