Went to the Hamilton gun show this last weekend. Didn’t really see much that jumped out at me. Really, I’ve got everything I need and most of what I want. At this point, it’s just gilding the lily to pick up another AR or Glock. And, honestly, I’d rather take that $400 and drop it into something that’ll generate a consistent return down the line.
Prices were fairly reasonable at the show. Primers were in the $75/brick range whcih, to my pre-Covd mind, is still an amazing ripoff. Plenty of ARs and AKs out there, as well as mags and ammo. There were the usual tables of ‘survival gear’ but, sadly, no Johnny Trochman. I guess if you go to a gun show and don’t see him it means were going to have another six weeks of nuclear winter.
I also swung by Trader Bros. on the way back to see how their massive storage food acquisition is going. It had definitely been whittled a bit, but any sales were offset by additional pallets (yes, wrapped pallets of buckets of food) that had been added since my last visit. Apparently they hit the PPE part of this guys stash because there were N95 masks, Tyvek suits, goggles, and gloves aplenty. I gotta hand it to the deceased survivalist….he definitely was walking it like he was talking it. I didn’t pick up anything because, honestly, I’m pretty squared away and don’t really have room for more.
Speaking of space, I’m still looking for that chunk o’dirt. I found a place that ticks off a great many of my little tickyboxes except…it’s too bloody far away. But, oh, its got some sweet features…biggest of which is that it butts up against BLM/state land which, in turn, butts up against a million acres of national forest. If only it wasnt so bloody far from here. So, the search continues on that front.
May one ask how far away this plot of land is? Just curious.
Several hours of drive, I haven’t ruled it out 100% yet, so I need to be a tad vague.
Two hours is nothing. It’s not like you are commuting to work every day from your retreat.
Where did you get 2 hours from?
The good buy right now seems to be 90% silver dimes, halves and quarters. The local coin store sees me coming they automatically pull out their stash. Inch and a quarter PVC makes a good storage container.
My LCS sells 90% at melt. I liberate as much as I can every week.
Remote land.
What do you gain?
Of course, I do not know where you live now- inner city? Go.
But there are a lot of places where one is safer with people around-
Humans formed villages for a reason. Then towns and city-states.
What stands out is that remote farms and retreats are easy targets for hostiles.
Because they will find you.
Elbow room is good, but a neighbor with a 30/06 within a few hundred yards is very reassuring.
Anon. here with another note- Public land can be a curse as well as a blessing- there is no control over it that you or neighbors can exact.
It can be overrun with homeless camps, or serve as a transient passage, or burn due to lack of forest management.
A analogy- we have a semi rural location, at the end of a dead end road. We put in a gate. The gate won’t stop anyone really intent on bad behavior. But what it does do, is to remove ambiguous intent-
if some stranger is past the gate, they have defined themselves as suspicious. There is no longer a “I was looking for Suzie’s house” excuse. Same with public land- no excuse needed. A friend went through a home invasion-burglary (he was asleep)the intruders used public space AKA a green belt/walking path to approach- nobody needs to explain themselves on a public path. So like everything, there are plus’s, and minus’s. I still like to have my support network within range.
That depends on who the neighbor is. Generally speaking, the one that would be useful with an ‘06, is the type of person ona big price of land in the middle of nowhere. Just my $.02.