Winter Cabin Trip

Leo Davie · November 03, 2016

With fall fading and Thanksgiving and Christmas around the corner, we decided to get out of the shop and enjoy some time outside before winter weather and holiday orders keep us indoors for many days on end.

Being in Virginia, we’re lucky to have a number of great options when it comes to getting outdoors. This time of year is pretty cold for camping but perfect for a cabin. One of our favorite spots is an old cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains on the border Shenandoah National Park and just a few miles from the AT. The cabin lacks some amenities (namely, power and water) but we are of the belief that if you have good friends, good food, and good beverages, then really, you have your essentials covered.

On this trip, schedules lined up for a great group of friends to join. Two of them really out did themselves: Will, an illustrator and designer (who sketched the whale on the Machine Era Godwin bottle opener), brought a film camera and captured these photographs of the trip. And Mark, who wears a white collar by day but could easily trade it in for a pit master's apron, brought his cooking prowess and we ate like kings – pancakes and bacon for breakfast, to-die-for fried chicken for dinner.

One of great delicacies to be enjoyed away from cell service and electricity is fried chicken and collards cooked over a woodfire stove. It takes a lot of work and a friend with a midas touch for southern dishes, but the payoff is well worth it.

When in a cabin in Appalachia first built ages ago by a farming family with a UK surname, it's only fitting to drink Irish cream in your morning coffee, bourbon on the porch in the afternoon, a good Virginia craft beer with dinner, and good scotch whisky around the fire at night (all in proper moderation of course – because it is a dark, cold run to the outhouse at night).

As much as we are makers and everyday carry enthusiasts, Machine Era produces a lot of wallets, so it can be nice to escape to a place where you don’t really need one for a few days (other than to open a beer of course). Trips like this are much needed out of the shop time to catch up with friends and unwind off the grid. Here's hoping you can find a cabin by a National Park or a good equivalent to get out to some time this season.