Euroka Trip 3-5 January 2018

On the 3rd of January, we travelled with our cousins to Euroka clearing for a three-day camping trip. We arrived in the early afternoon, and we were able to set up the yurt in about an hour and a half. Since we are well-practised, it wasn't too hard to set up. The main difficulty we experienced while setting up the yurt was that the campground was on a slight slope, so half of the poles had to be shortened to level the roof.

During the trip, we did lots of activities, like swimming at Jellybean Pool and going on bike rides. The weather was very hot on the 4th and 5th, so we spent quite a while at the pool. The water there was the perfect temperature for swimming and relaxing, and we spent lots of time there. At the pool, there are many high rocks which are perfect for jumping off, into the cool water. It was lots of fun spending time there with our cousins.

On the 4th, we decided to go on a bike ride to Red Hands Cave, an Aboriginal cave where there are many handprints and stencils on the walls. The trip there was about an hour's ride, which was difficult for the youngest member of our party. The cave is impressive, with many handprints dating back an estimated 1600 years- well before the first European settlers arrived in Australia.

A dirt road led up to the ridge where the campsite is situated. We took advantage of this road by skidding and drifting on our bikes. This was a great way to spend time, and we had competitions to see who could skid the furthest and longest.

There was plenty of wildlife in the area we were camping. Lots of kangaroos were in the field adjacent to the campsite, and let us come quite close before jumoing away. The cockatoos and other birds woke us up every morning with their loud shrieks and calls. At night we heard wolves howling at the moon, which had been full a few nights before. The wolves were quite close, and we could hear their howls very clearly through the night. There were also many cicadas in the bush around us, and they provided constant background noise while were there.

We ate well, and cooked sausages and chicken on the campfire. We also made potatoes in the coals, which turned out quite well.

Wolf howls: https://youtu.be/KhQGo2ldA9s

Cicada Noises: https://youtu.be/OAc6sPDs68

Euroka January 2016

 

We set up with friends at the Daruk site. We are having a good time, exploring the park, swimming at Jellybean pool. Then it starts raining. As the rain continues day by day, more and more campers from neighbouring campsites are leaving until we are one of the few ones left in the national park. We are quite happy inside the yurt, keeping the fire burning for warmth and comfort. 

On the third day of rain, a friendly ranger comes to our tent site and enquires about our plans and whether we have intentions to stay or leave. We reply that we are quite comfortable and have no intentions of leaving earlier than planned.

An hour later he returns and tells us that he might have to order us the leave as the water in the causeway at the park entrance is rising and the causeway might become impassable. He tells us that there is no rush but that we should get ready. Fifteen minutes later, the ranger returns with the message “You have leave right now!”. Obviously, there is no time to pack, let alone to take down the yurt, which is completely wet on the outside anyway. So we grab the crate with the food and the esky with the perishable food, load it into the car. Before leaving, I make sure that I close the yurt carefully and do one last check of all guy ropes. The ranger’s vehicle leads our small convoy of three or four cars of the last remaining campers towards the park entrance. At the causeway, a truck of the NPWS with a vehicle trailer awaits us. The rangers tell us that we have the choice of having our vehicles ferried across the causeway on the trailer or leave them inside the part. The indicators show that the water has risen to 0.6 metres – too much for a non-off-road vehicles to cross. I decide to leave my car parked inside the park and our friends drive their 4WD across. On the other side we all hop into their car and they drop us home.

For the next couple of days, the rainy and windy weather continues. At night I am not sleeping well, worrying about the yurt, imagining what would happen if the wind ripped it apart. Then, the sunny weather returns. I am keen to get back into the park to collect the yurt but the park remains closed for several days. What anguish. I’m now starting to worry that curious hiker and mountain bike riders who go into the park while it is still closed to vehicles might do something to the abandoned yurt. Then finally, on day five, the national park is finally open. Our friends collect us, we go back to the Daruk campsite. To our great relief and amazement the yurt stands there, completely intact, perfectly straight and dry by now. What a beautiful sight. A weight lifts off my chest. We take down the yurt, pack everything up and get home safely.

 

QR code from Kyrgyzstan - part 2

The day has come - the first side wall is being decorated and I'm a bit nervous. If I mess it up, I probably won't be able to wash the textile paint off, a messy job will be visible to everyone and replacing a side wall would be expensive and time consuming, given the fact that it had to come from Germany. So better not to mess it up.

I lay the chosen double side wall out on a trestle table and use chalk to mark the top and bottom edges of the patterns and the spacing between the individual prints. I debate with myself how far from the top edge of the fabric I should place the pattern. Not too high because of the yurt roof's eaves. It is a guessing game and I won't know if I picked the right distance until it is all complete and I set up the yurt next time… Then the great moment: starting with the QR code screen as the central pattern, I carefully position the screen. One problem becomes obvious immediately: I cannot see through the screen's plywood frame to see the chalk lines that indicate the edges of the pattern.

Eventually I think I have the right position and start squeegeeing the white textile paint through the screen. The paint's consistency is perfect and I make sure I cover each little square of the QR code from several directions. When I carefully lift the screen, I'm quite pleased with the result - all squares appear to have come out well. While the paint is still we I scan the code and to my great relief it works! I'm so excited that I scan several times from all sorts of angles and it works each time.

However, the pattern looks a bit forlorn on the large black canvas - it urgently needs its friends. So, next its the turn of the other screen with the Kyrgyz pattern. I don't do a pattern adjacent to the QR code because the plywood frame of the Kyrgyz pattern screen would touch it's still wet paint. Instead, I leave a gap for now. That makes it even more important that I get the position of the screen right. Again, lots of guestimation is required but eventually I have the first Kyrgyz pattern printed as well.

I keep going printing one Kyrgyz pattern after the other, each time leaving a gap adjacent to recently printed patterns and going back and printing in the gap once I'm sure the paint of both its neighbour patterns is sufficiently dry. I pay lots of attention to wipe any textile paint from the underside of the screen and plywood frame each time before I place the screen. This requires repeated washing and drying the entire screen including the frame. But it pays off and after several hours the first half of the double side wall is printed with the QR code in the middle and four Kyrgyz patterns on either side.

The screens for both patterns also have a section of the common top and bottom stripe. That is a good start for the strip but requires additional work with a paintbrush to fill in the gaps. A big initial headache is the edge of this stripe. I realise very quickly that with a paintbrush and the highly viscous textile paint I will not be able to draw a crisp, sharp edge for this stripe. I leave that problem unresolved for now.

During another session on another day I print the second half of the double side wall in exactly the same way as the first half. Then I have an idea about the edge of the stripe: I remember watching my mother many years ago applying gutta-percha - which must be of similar viscosity to my textile paint - to silk scarfs in preparation for painting on them. She used a small, squeezable plastic bottle with a small, detachable metal nozzle. I try the local art and craft shop and to my great surprise they have one of these. It works like a treat. Using a small syringe, I fill the plastic bottle with textile paint, attach the nozzle and can - by squeezing the bottle - apply the right amount of paint while guiding the nozzle along a ruler. The result is a straight and crisp edge to the pattern's white top and bottom stripes. I am pleased although it is quite a bit of work.

After everything has had time to dry for a few days, the fun part of heat fixating can begin. I turn the iron up to full heat and use a dish cloth between the textile paint and the iron. How long am I supposed to apply the heat for? I have no idea. Figuring it can hardly be overdone, I try to get each area of fabric that has been painted under the iron long enough so that it is clearly hot when touching. It is enough? The first rain will show. If it wasn't enough the painstakingly screen printed patterns might run down the side wall leaving a whitish mess. I hope not.

A few weeks after the painting is complete, spring has arrived and I take the first opportunity to see how the pattern looks. I am quite happy with the result. The yurt no bears a visible connection to its great-grand uncles in Central Asia. Only five more side walls to go.
The only problem: there is no mobile reception at the campground, so scanning the QR code does not given an immediate result. I wonder how often this will happen…

Euroka October 2014

Back at Euroka - great as always and turning a few of the other campers' heads. Not everyone was happy though - some thought we are taking up too much space.

 

 

QR code from Kyrgyzstan - part 1

So, we were asking ourselves, how do we advertise the blog in style on the yurt?

The black canvas walls are perfectly suited for decorating. Many groups in Germany decorate their yurts with their own customised patterns. We decided that a QR code - integrated in a pattern - would be both decorative and useful in drawing attention to the blog. When we started looking for suitable patterns we came across patterns that are used to decorate yurts in Kyrgyzstan. These patterns often symbolise ram's horns, tulips, soldiers, or dog's tails. Quite often, these patterns are black and white, and are composed squares. Could the Kyrgyzstanis have invented the QR code thousands of years ago?

The next challenge was to design a pattern that could be printed in white on a black background, and would contain the QR code and traditional Kyrgyz patterns. We tried many drafts until we found one that worked. I really like the very clever pattern with the tulips but the 45 degree angles and curves just didn't work with the unforgiving grid pattern of the QR code. However, this pattern made me realise the benefit of the stripes running along the top and the bottom to visually hold the patterns together.







The next challenge was to find a DIY technique to print the pattern on to the canvas. We decided on screen printing using StencilPro photo emulsion-coated screens. We needed two screens: one with the QR code and one with the Kyrgyz pattern. Both were to have a stripe running along the top and the bottom to visually hold the patterns together. Making the screens involved printing the patterns onto transparent overhead film, exposing the photo emulsion in sun light and rinsing off the unfixated (unexposed) areas of the emulsion with water. We mounted the finished screens on plywood frames and chose white textile paint that could be heat-fixated by ironing. Since the craft shop didn't have any squeegees small enough we made one from am strip of plywood with old bicycle inner tube stapled to it. The first couple of test prints looked quite promising.

 

Bedroom

I have had this idea many years ago: wouldn’t it be great if I could connect – dock, so to speak – my long-serving Hilleberg Namatj tunnel tent to a yurt. Some youth groups do exactly that – they use multiple sleeping tents connected to the yurt in a star shape. While I have never experienced that I myself, can see how appealing this concept is. The yurt’s main room becomes the living / dining room / kitchen which is connected to several “bedrooms”. Tortuga offers the “Ramses” tent which is specifically designed to connect to a standard yurt – although requiring high side walls.

So, I have had this trusty little tunnel tent by Hilleberg for at least 20 years which looked like the perfect candidate for connecting to the yurt. Its advantages – besides the fact that I already have it – are that

a)      its width suits perfectly to the width of one of the yurt’s side walls and

b)      it has a zip-able vestibule extension in front of the entrance, allowing converting the Namatj 3 to a Namatj 3 GT. The current version of the Namatj does not have this anymore – it comes either as version with short or long vestibule.

first concept design

With the right customised yurt side wall segment I could remove the vestibule’s apsis and zip it to the wall. I only need a spare yurt side wall and the correct zipper. The sidewall was on sale as a factory second at Ralph’s www.jurtenland.de because its dimensions were slightly off spec. I figured that this should not matter with the large opening that I was about to cut into it. Getting hold of the correct zipper required a bit of research. Hilleberg’s website recommends the Outdoor Service Team company (www.outdoor-service.com) in Berlin for repairs on their tents. Birgit Prasse responded to my email and was extremely helpful. She had to refer back to Hilleberg and was able get the correct zipper to me in very short time and very cheaply. I then marked on the side wall where the zipper needs to go and took it to a local upholsterer who sewed it in.

And that was all. I couldn’t wait to test it. I worked perfectly with no need for any modifications. It is really popular with the children – they all want to sleep in there. And I had thought everybody wanted to sleep in the yurt and the Namatj would become the “naughty corner”.

 

Cuboree 2014

We took the yurt to another of its native habitats - Cataract Scout Park for Cuboree 2014. With its dark interior it provided the right atmosphere for the achievement badge "Space" in the GWS Region base.

Thanks, Anne, for having us - it was great.