How to make a rocket stove

Stoking up the rocket stove with a few twigs

What is a rocket stove? It’s a hollowed out log with a fire inside, that has a hole in the side to direct the breeze which fans the fire, and hence it burns like a rocket!

There are a few ways to make a rocket stove, you can cut a log and drill holes into it, make one from a bundle of sticks, and this version where we split a log and do some sawing and chopping.

It’s a lot like the Swedish Fire Log, a log split or cut, then set on fire in the gaps between the segments of the log. However, this version, the rocket stove, will burn hotter, because of the airflow directed into the heart of the fire through the hole at the bottom of the log!

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Learning with the San-Bushman in Namibia

As a child I’d heard of the bushman though the story telling of Laurens van der Post, his books and films. Many years later, my intrigue in their culture and hunter-gatherer way of life still yearned to experience how they lived. How does an egalitarian culture that has existed for thousands of years manage alongside the modern-westernised world of the 21st century? What wisdom do they have to offer us, should we ask? And, what skills can we learn from the bushman? Just some of my questions I felt needed answers. Continue reading “Learning with the San-Bushman in Namibia”