Back Yard Quinzee

Well, we'd had a good drop of snow, so I decided to make the most of it and build a shelter. The snow was too powdery to make an Igloo, so I decided on a Quinzee. To make one, I needed to make a mound of snow and hollow out the inside to make the shelter. In order to keep the walls a uniform thickness, twigs of the same length are inserted into the outside walls and the inside is hollowed out until the ends of the twigs are exposed.

I started off by clearing my Yard of snow and piling it all up in a corner.

Almost enough snow. Another couple of hours work and there will be enough

The twigs used to measure the thickness of the walls

The twigs inserted into the walls

Now starting to hollow out the shelter

The door needs to be just big enough to be able to crawl into

Again, if I was in a wilderness area, I'd have dug down into the floor a lot more, creating a cold sink and would have made a sleeping platform at a higher level than the floor

Inside the Quinzee

The twigs are exposed on the inside indicating the correct wall thickness.

It's important to make the inside walls as smooth as possible so as to avoid condensation drips and also you need to create a ventilation hole through to the outside, especially when you close up the entrance during the night