1999: A Day Of Splitting Wood

This was a common occurrence at the tipi and only varied by the type of maul I used and by how new the handle was to do it with, as broken, split and worn out handles came and went.

I always kept a spare in the lodge and even went thru several maul heads over the years. In the middle picture you can see I am using a brand new, still varnished handle.

There was nothing better than splitting a good piece of oak or poplar, and nothing worse than trying to split a knotty or branching piece of oak. This picture shows me after a hard day of splitting wood during a winter snowstorm. The red stick on the right is one of my many homemade walking sticks which I made from a sapling and debarked and painted. I broke dozens going up and down the trail.