Retreat Requirements: List them here

I'm not asking for wish lists based on you winning the lottery. What I would like to hear are what features you are looking for in a Retreat. Skip the basics. For instance we all need water, but what do you consider optimal; flowing like a river or still like a pond, cistern or well........you get the idea. Post what you think are crucial and what would be icing on the cake.

Feel free to talk amoung yourselves......

Phishi

 

Defenceable
good soil for crops in case of long term
good graze for critters to feed me later
game to suplement meat I raise
trees for firewood and possible building if needed
prefer water in well and pond, pond backs up well if needed for potable
water as well as if needed for fire controle and can be fished but wont
bring NBC to you if those become a concern
stocked
OWNED if you dont own it or at least rent/lease it others likely would think of
the same place and may or may not have more claim, you would fight to
save your family...count on it, so would they so removeing them is likely to
mean a body count, make sure you have the claim to it

There would be the short list on requirements.

 

Given a choice I would go with fully rural, you can still trade with the locals but dont have so many refugees or whatever comeing that may want a lot of things but not to trade for.

 

Rural as in isolation, or rural as in a farm in a rural community?

Phishi

 

That is a tough one. If it were extremely rural, you would have the opportunity to farm and hunt without outside pressure. Of course that could be a problem too. MZB attack, medical help a long ways away. A rural community is probably the best bet. Where you either have enough land for a smaller scale garden, or you could put up a community garden, and you would have the community for help, be it medical or security from MZBs.

 

What? Who? Me!

Phishi

 

For the record your honor, I did not lead the witness......

Phishi

 

I'm with RightHand and Ghrit on this. I'm looking for a rural place with at least half the acreage I now have. Small community or small town within 10-15 miles, high ground, with lots of trees. My clan is not isolationist, but we do like space to wave our arms about. Nearest neighbor now is 1/2 mile away. Wish me luck in my search.

 

My observations, so far, have been that the average person has 1/2 or less than a tank of gas in their vehicle at any given time. That will limit their travel distance, I think. But that would still get them an average of at least a hundred miles. Hmmm.

 

Requirements pretty much exactly like what I'm moving to in just over a month. With the rest of the family.

Roughly 40 acres.

Rural Community - 10 miles from small town & 50 miles from large city.
house itself only 50 yards off the road, but that road is 2 miles off main
road with 4 houses in between.

Likeminded, food producing, self reliant neighbors, many related. Only possible drawback being some Klan in the neighborhood, but since I'm not in a targeted group, they would likely be beneficial.

Water - Hand pump well 20 ft. from back door, small pond about a hundred yards away.

Lots of trees - Walnut, Pecan, Apple, Pear, Oak and Hickory for fuel.

About 10 acres of pasture w/cattle barn & fencing.

Crop Field up the hill.

Large backyard garden.

Small Greenhouse

Workshop/Shed

Lots of deer, turkey, rabbit, squirrel, dove


I'm pretty jazzed about moving up there. I just need to add a pigpen and a smokehouse and I'm pretty much set.

 

On the 'tank of gas from metro' thing it becomes pretty open ended and subjective IMO. First off figure that a lot of folks only have say a 12 gallon tank on the most common cars and get around 20 mpg so that would be around 240 miles, in my state at least I dont think you can get 240 miles from the nearest metro without getting closer than that to the next one. So we look at the fact that most of them only have aroun 1/2 tank and it cuts it to 120 miles, still a little touchey but may be doable in some areas. Then comes the biger things though, if they are not in the very first few to leave then in any SHTF situation traffic in a metro area would be the worst rush hour times 10 so at least half their gas is likely to burn waiting to move and once a few dozen cars run out of gas in the drive lanes, since no one will let them merge to the shoulder even if they tried, then the main routs are blocked. If they do make it out of the cluster then they are more and more likely the further they get to find gas available to keep on going.

My basic point is that there are to many factors IMO to be able to even determin how far 'a tank of gas away' is and if you do then its dificult in most parts of the country to be over 125-150 miles at most from a reasonably major city. To me the biggest thing for this part of it is to be off the main routes through the area and at least 5-7 days hike from the cities, so say 70+ miles and further is better as long as the job market will allow you to sustain there in present times since if you are haveing to race the other folks out of the metro to get there then it may not work well for you.

 

Small communities will tend to get very protective in times of duress. I have witnessed this while working disasters in rural areas. It takes more than owning the title to a property that you visit a few times a year to become part of a small community. With that said, many of us still plan to bug towards areas that we have no rightful claim other than owning some property. I have toyed with the notion of starting a small retreat on property owned by relatives and placing a full-time care-taker familly, like a hunting camp/working farm to acclimate into the community. I don't mind the notion of being James Smith's daughter's husband that has the horses down at their old place. He brings friends in to hunt several times a year and they seem ok...and Bubba has a sweet deal, they let him farm that back forty and all he has to do is keep the main house stocked with firewood and chase off a poacher once in a while. I think a hunting retreat/working farm would be the ideal answer to setting up a survival community. A co-op could be set up to finance the purchase of said property, reducing the member payments to a minimum. Annual dues could be paid to subsidize improvements such as additional housing and storage. Group standardation of equipment and supplies could be designed to facilitate preparedness and with a little proper planning, the care-taker could actually turn a small profit. Produce from the property could be preserved and stored or sold, as is necessary but would have the working infrastructure in place to survive and support a small community.