I am now comfortable in the woods like I never have been before. Being lost does not scare me as much as it used to, for I know that if I was lost I could create shelter, make fire, and take care of my most basic needs. A price cannot be placed on this type of confidence with wilderness survival skills. -A.J.
Learn skills that can save your life, with our experienced staff to guide you. Gain knowledge of the key elements needed for survival in the outdoors unaided by modern tools.
- Build shelters from natural materials
- Locate and purify water
- Create fire from friction
- Make your own tools
- Practice methods of obtaining wild foods
- And much more!
Wilderness Survival Skills Course Schedule
Weekend and Week-long Courses
Wilderness Survival Basics
This course will be a solid introduction to the skills and knowledge necessary to live through a short-term wilderness survival situation – under 72 hours. Topics will include basic gear that you need, survival priorities, and most importantly, how to maintain an upright mind. We will teach essential skills like building a fire, making a life-saving shelter, purifying water, navigation, hygiene, and wild edibles.
Ages 18+ $195, February 8-9, 2013 9am-5pm each day
Ages 18+ $195, May 11-12, 2013 9am-5pm each day
Ages 18+ $195, July 27-28, 2013 9am-5pm each day
More details & online registration
Wooden Bow Making
Can only woodland elves and mountain men make their own bow? It turns out that through hard work and focus, you too can learn how to turn a stick into a bow in a weekend!
Join us and you will learn the ancient art of tillering, fundamentals of woodworking, using tools efficiently, and tapping into our capacity for listening to wood. By the end of the weekend you will have made your own wooden longbow with carved bow handles, as well as your own bowstrings!
Ages 18+ $225, March 22-24, 2013, 7-9pm Fri, 9am-5pm Sat & Sun
More details & online registration
Art of Flintknapping Weekend
Participants will come away with the basics of flintknapping: material selection, pressure flaking, percussion flaking, notching, and hafting. We will start with the fundamentals and everyone will make several functional pieces. Our material of choice will be obsidian. This hands-on class will open your eyes to a new world of working with stone.
Ages 18+ $195, April 27-28, 2013, 9am-5pm each day
Buckskin Hide Tanning
Learn to make buckskin using the traditional method of brain tanning. In this class, you will create a beautiful and functional fabric that is extremely useful. We will use methods of tanning hides that all of our ancestors knew at one point in time. This class will be fun and challenging at the same time!
Ages 18+ $245, Jul 5-7, 2013, 9am-5pm each day
More details & online registration
Wilderness Survival Walkabout Expedition
Explore the Central Washington high desert, experiencing the freedom of walking across a landscape and trusting the earth to provide for all of your needs! During this week-long course, you will learn and apply wilderness survival skills as the opportunity and need arises. Learning navigation techniques and fire-making, finding and constructing shelter, locating wild edibles and water by identifying of indicator species; this challenging wilderness survival course gives you the opportunity to experience the abundance nature provides to those with the awareness to notice.
Ages Adult $985, June 23-29, 2013, 3pm Sunday-3pm Saturday
More details & online registration
Year Round
9-Month Survival School and more – Anake Outdoor School
Immerse yourself in nine months of thorough grounding in every aspect of our curriculum, spent as part of a supportive community of fellow learners. It is perhaps unique as a survival school: the hard skills necessary to journey into nature without modern gear are blended with the naturalist knowledge to feel at home wherever you venture. At the Anake Outdoor School, you will develop the eyes, the ears, and the awareness with which to help our culture move forward into the future in a healthy and sustainable way.
Adult $10,350 Scholarships available, 33 weeks Sept-June, Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday with extended trips
More details & online registration
Home Study
The Kamana Naturalist Training Program is a comprehensive home study course that covers the naturalist background needed to engage in the wilderness arts, including wilderness survival skills and primitive living skills, wildlife tracking, bird language, traditional herbalism, and naturalist mentoring. Begin with Kamana One: Exploring Natural Mystery. During this short course you will experience two weeks of awareness exercises and six areas of ecological study using a field guide and audio series narrated by Jon Young. Begin to see the world through “native eyes.”
Adult Kamana One starts at $85, Learn at your own pace
Monthly
Many of the region’s finest naturalists share their wisdom at REI in downtown Seattle. Wilderness Survival or related topics are often featured in these talks.
Ages Adult FREE, Wilderness Awareness School is featured periodically