A Different Take on BOL's

[helomech]

so for you guys who live at your BOL's please list what would ever make you leave or simply evacuate.....or is this thought too deep that it needs its own topic, if so mods feel free to move.

I live at my BOL, there is almost nothing that would make me leave, as in almost nothing....... I can't stay if the place is engulfed with wild fires, even though I'm probably the only house with a water sprinkler system to the roof....or should there be some sort of pandemic in my immediate area .....I'm covered for things like flood, but should a tornado take the house , as long as I can scour the country side and pick up most of my crap, I can stay and rebuild.

thoughts ??

I would leave if wildfires where close, or any disaster that was very short term. I will not leave for anything during a long term shtf event, or end of the world as we know it type event.

[GaMtnLady]

We, too, live at our BOL in a rural area not too distant from a very large metropolitan area. Good climate, good growing season, water on site, and not drought prone. We are on 2 1/2+ acres, with chickens, pigs and a garden. Just got a fireplace insert with a cook top and can't say enough good about it. I've been prepping for over a year and now, my husband really thinks I have the right idea. He is now a HAM so next on our list is power. We are both still working so not as much time as we would like for doing everything. I have to laugh when we watch Doom's Day Preppers who are preparing for "X". If that's it, you obviously haven't been paying attention to "Y" or "Z". We can't prepare for everything. It's just plain impossible. What is possible to me is to prepare to live in a self-sustaining manner and hopefully not move back to the 18th century to do it. Our object is to be prepared for next week, next month, next year, and the year after where we are. No plans for running. History shows us, that those who take action are the minority. I fully expect that if the SHTF, most folks in the large cities will sit and wait to be fed until they are too weak or too dead to make it to where I am. Survival of the fittest is not a joke as I fear we will soon find out. So our plan is to always be able to have Bacon, Eggs and Hash Browns for breakfast and then tackle what ever is next for the day.

[4suchatimeasthis]

^^^ Hey, you are our kind of lady! Come hang out with us gals in the Ladies forum

[Sniper-T]

Welcome aboard Gamtnlady! Sounds like you're well on your way! looking forward to hearing more of your posts

[Jerry D Young]

Well, I think I may be a minority (as if I wasn't already), but if you live there, it isn't a BOL. It might be the homestead and a way to get away from things happening now. But if certain things happen, you will have to leave the place and go to a true bug out location. What might drive one out varies widely with the specifics of the home, but there will be things that will run you out.

So my thoughts on a BOL are that it should be somewhere well away from the homestead, preferably several of them in different directions. But they need not be another homestead or castle. Just a series of caches that contain what is needed to get by for several days, weeks, or even months until residency can be resumed at the homestead, or in the worst case, a new start is made somewhere else. My ideal BOL is a concrete block (or ICF w/CMU facing) 'hunting cabin' on privately owned land near or in a state or national forest. With thicker concrete walls and roof, a right angle entry and the building can be quite a good fallout shelter.

Constructed properly, the cabin can be nearly vandal and fire proof, with only bolted down steel furnishings (bunks w/o matresses, a table and benches, perhaps a counter top). All the necessities would be cached nearby. That can include a steel door that is removed and cached so the inclination by others to stay in it is reduced significantly. Also, with a hidden pipe leading from inside the cabin to a concealed point that can be used to blow smoke (or other irritants) inside to run squatters out, can make taking it back from unathorized use easier.

Things like a well or other water source and a septic system can be installed but not hooked up, with the rest of the components cached can make it more livable, without making it an ideal place for squatters.

Just my minority opinion.

[helomech]

Well, I think I may be a minority (as if I wasn't already), but if you live there, it isn't a BOL. It might be the homestead and a way to get away from things happening now. But if certain things happen, you will have to leave the place and go to a true bug out location. What might drive one out varies widely with the specifics of the home, but there will be things that will run you out.

So my thoughts on a BOL are that it should be somewhere well away from the homestead, preferably several of them in different directions. But they need not be another homestead or castle. Just a series of caches that contain what is needed to get by for several days, weeks, or even months until residency can be resumed at the homestead, or in the worst case, a new start is made somewhere else. My ideal BOL is a concrete block (or ICF w/CMU facing) 'hunting cabin' on privately owned land near or in a state or national forest. With thicker concrete walls and roof, a right angle entry and the building can be quite a good fallout shelter.

Constructed properly, the cabin can be nearly vandal and fire proof, with only bolted down steel furnishings (bunks w/o matresses, a table and benches, perhaps a counter top). All the necessities would be cached nearby. That can include a steel door that is removed and cached so the inclination by others to stay in it is reduced significantly. Also, with a hidden pipe leading from inside the cabin to a concealed point that can be used to blow smoke (or other irritants) inside to run squatters out, can make taking it back from unathorized use easier.

Things like a well or other water source and a septic system can be installed but not hooked up, with the rest of the components cached can make it more livable, without making it an ideal place for squatters.

Just my minority opinion.

So when you reach this place then it is no longer your BOL? I have already bugged out, and no real shtf is going to make me leave alive. Not going to happen. Sure for a disaster I will leave, but only short term, to the holiday inn. If things get bad all over I am staying here and fighting to the death. This is my BOL, I just got here early, so far about 7 years to early and counting.

[4suchatimeasthis]

^^^I guess it could still technically still be defined as your BOL, but only if you don's stay there permanently? So, go rent a place in the city, and then your home can be a BOL, lol. JK, obviously. I can see how for a single individual this might work, but I can't imagine that for a group or a family (especially with small children) it would be the best option. Not to mention, having several BOL in various rural areas.....well, unless you intend to become a squatter yourself (which raises problems with pre-positioning a cache), it would be prohibitively expensive to actualize.

So, I propose an alternative. If there is a regional SHTF (fire, chemical, weather related, etc), BO to a fellow preppers homestead, with whom you have already pre-positioned preps, and with whom you have a plan established. My place can be your BOL, and your place can be my BOL, lol. We each prep x amount of xyz, as per an agreement, and there ya go, problem solved, lol.

[Jimmy24]

Well, I think I may be a minority (as if I wasn't already), but if you live there, it isn't a BOL. It might be the homestead and a way to get away from things happening now. But if certain things happen, you will have to leave the place and go to a true bug out location. What might drive one out varies widely with the specifics of the home, but there will be things that will run you out.

So my thoughts on a BOL are that it should be somewhere well away from the homestead, preferably several of them in different directions. But they need not be another homestead or castle. Just a series of caches that contain what is needed to get by for several days, weeks, or even months until residency can be resumed at the homestead, or in the worst case, a new start is made somewhere else. My ideal BOL is a concrete block (or ICF w/CMU facing) 'hunting cabin' on privately owned land near or in a state or national forest. With thicker concrete walls and roof, a right angle entry and the building can be quite a good fallout shelter.

Constructed properly, the cabin can be nearly vandal and fire proof, with only bolted down steel furnishings (bunks w/o matresses, a table and benches, perhaps a counter top). All the necessities would be cached nearby. That can include a steel door that is removed and cached so the inclination by others to stay in it is reduced significantly. Also, with a hidden pipe leading from inside the cabin to a concealed point that can be used to blow smoke (or other irritants) inside to run squatters out, can make taking it back from unathorized use easier.

Things like a well or other water source and a septic system can be installed but not hooked up, with the rest of the components cached can make it more livable, without making it an ideal place for squatters.

Just my minority opinion.

You know what Jerry, your correct. I actually live in my BIL...BUG IN LOCATION....

Jimmy