The Retreat

The Retreat
Where do you have your retreat?

There are many within the survival community that
says that you should find a small town, and purchase a house there. The reasoning
being that in that way you will have support from the town people and that
they will defend their community when the ball drops. This might be a valid plan
with some small communities, but for most it is not so good. Many of the
small communities in a lot of states, that have less than 3000 people do not
even have a grocery store, and many have no gas station. They are no longer
in any form self reliant. Now once you get into the 3000 plus size community,
you now again have the same problem as with the larger cities. You have the
crime and the looters already there, just waiting to do their thing at the first
sign of a disaster. Besides, in any small town you will have 90% of the people
stand by and wring their hands, and only a few that will actually want to
prepare and secure the town. It is not likely that the ones that want to secure can
even begin their preparation until the first group of looters has already
arrived and taken over. What do I mean by taken over? Let’s say we have twenty
well armed men come in. The first thing they would do is round up 40 or 50
women and children and secure them in one of the stores. They would then demand
that all the supplies that they want be brought to them. Now in many of the
small towns, what they want might not even be available, so they would kill some of
the children. And make more demands. It will now be almost impossible to
set up a defense to protect the town. Even if a defense was set up before the
first group of looters arrive, how many of the good town folks do you think
will man the guns once the shooting starts? Remember these are not trained
military, or if they were it was WWII or at best Nam. The young are leaving
the small towns, so mostly the old is still there.
For this and many other reasons I do not consider the small town as a suitable retreat.
Besides, for the first few years, even if living there full time, you are one of the outsiders
and not trusted. (In other words part of the problem)
I instead believe that a small farm a couple of miles out of town is better. I will explain why latter. The small farm will give you a chance to plant your survival garden. You also have the land where you can hunt and fish if you have a pond or better if there is a river or a large creek on the land. You can also plant fruit and nut trees scattered among the other trees. Plant trees for wood also. You want a large part of the land in woods. With a few meadows intermingled with berry patches.

Now as you would not be able to defend your farm against even a few looters,
you need to have some way to hide from them. The only safe place is under ground,
so if you have purchased in hill country, you can dig into the side of a hill and build an underground retreat that way. This is best as that will provide drainage. If you are on level ground, you will have to contend with leakage into your under ground retreat much of the time.
Why create problems if you don’t have to? So what do you look for? Hilly
country, a creek or river, wooded land, at least 10 acres wooded. Another 4 or 5
cultivated or meadow with a house. (You can put a mobile home on the land if
doesn’t have a house. A well, utilities if don’t go off grid and access by road, but
not on a major road. Preferable you will have no neighbors within a quarter
mile. Your underground retreat should have enough room to live comfortable, that
means at least 20 square feet for each member. It won’t be like home but you
don’t feel too cramped with that much space. You also need storage for food, water
and equipment. Do not have all of your supplies in the main retreat. In case that it is discovered, for that same reason, have an exit that is on the other side of the hill. Hide the entrance as best you can and if it is away from the buildings there is less chance of being discovered. Preferably yours
will not be the only wooded area around, so there is not much reason for the
looters to look farther than the farm building for something to take. Most will
not be hunters and the few that are will be looking for something like deer.
If in an area where there are cattle around, they will probably go where the
cattle are and stay out of the woods. Cattle are easier to hunt than deer and
provide more meat. A dome structure is best for your underground shelter. Build out
of ferroconcrete will probably be best as that can be done in place. Using
small rebar ¼ or 3/8 it can be bent in place and the ¼ mesh can
be cut into 2 foot wide strips and tied into the structure, chicken wire added in will
allow you to place concrete into the mesh making the dome between 1 and 2 inches
thick. This is thick enough to support about three feet of earth above and if
curved all the way down, will not be forced in by the surrounding dirt. Start
the dome about three or more feet in from the edge. A twenty foot dome will be
10 feet high in the center and will have about 300 square feet of living space.
If needing more room create a second dome connected by a tunnel, at least
3 feet long. If done in this manner you should be able to hide your retreat
from prying eyes, even during construction.