5 Tips for Surviving a Zombie Apocalypse
It’s October 31st… lets face it, if the undead are ever going to rise it’s going to be today. If it isn’t today it might be next year.. or the one after that. Which means you have time to prepare. And preparation, in the event of zombie attack, is key. If the zombies do rise up today then there’s not so much preparation time and you’d better read this fast.
In essence… you’re going to need a source of food and water, you’re going to need a place to hide, you’re going to need weapons and you’re going to need some kind of kooky ‘how-did-I-end-up-with-this-bunch-of-weirdos’ bunch of weirdos to surround yourself with. These are called ‘survivors’ and you want to be one of them.
So, how can I be a survivor?
First of all you need to accept the situation : Stages of Grief as Applied to a Zombie Outbreak.
(http://www.cracked.com/funny-1077-zombie-survival/)
5 ways to survive the Zombie Apocalypse
1. Secure food and water
2. Choose your weapon wisely
3. Find transportation
4. Hole up
5. Repopulate the earth
1. Food and Water
You’re going to need to find a decent stash of food somewhere – basements and outhouses tend to be popular for your Apocalypse hoard but you do need to consider getting trapped. If you’re going to get trapped anywhere it may as well be with the food but ideally you need to find other survivors so you can repopulate the Earth – see point 5. This part may or may not be fun depending on the other survivors.
If you haven’t pre-prepared your stash of survival food you’ll probably want to head for the outskirts of cities (see point 3). The main supply depots for supermarkets are going to be a better bet in terms of minimising encounters with the marauding undead than heading for Waitrose in Greenwich or Tescos at Bank. Attempting Waitrose in Greenwich on a regular Saturday afternoon is probably good preparation for fighting zombies though.
2. Weapons
In order not to get trapped while stocking up on supplies (it doesn’t count as looting once its survival) you’re going to need a weapon or two. You can probably guess which way we swing with this one. Silent, deadly, reusable ammunition… we have a whole “Archery and the Zombie Apolcalypse” series pencilled in for 2014. Get your archery lessons started now kids. You won’t regret it when the undead rabble are snapping at your wing-mirrors.
3. Transport
Depending on what type of undead horde you’re working with it’s usually a good plan to get out of town. If it’s the “Hell is full – now they walk the Earth” kind of zombie you’ll definitely want to avoid old civil war battlesites / Indian burial grounds (not so many of these in the Home Counties but you know what we mean – probably stay away from Hadrian’s wall). There are probably still going to be less bodies out in the sticks. If its your standard…
“Oh, no! The damn monkey’s escaped from the lab…”
“What’s that you just said cannon-fodder lab technician? You don’t mean…? NOT…. NOT…. THE INFECTED monkeys??”
…type of outbreak that’s going to infect the living you definitely want to be out of the city.
So, once you’ve shot your way out of London (you’ll need a nice clean headshot for each zombie – seriously, get some practice in) you’re going to need to grab the wheel of a truck in order to get outta town. If you should find yourself in California you’re going to want to get yourselves one of the fabulous truck campers rented by our sister company Silver Ash Campers. If you’re stuck in England any kind of campervan will do. You want tanks to hold water and enough space to seat your group of quirky cannon-fodder (sorry survivors). Allow some space for bows and arrows – a couple of take down recurves, maybe a compound or two and a horsebow if you want to go trad. (If you arent sure on the differences check our last blog post). If you really can’t find an archery shop to loot you’ll need to read our later blog post on ‘How to make a longbow in the event of a zombie apocalypse’. In essence this blog post will advise you to make it quickly – somewhere out of sight. We recommend starting archery now so you already have a bow that you’re familiar with. Remember : Preparation Prevents Poor Practice.
4. Hiding Out
Find someplace safe to hide out and practice your archery. The more practice you can get the better your chances with the undead – this is also true for archery competitions. The more you practice the better you’ll get. Honestly. (See ‘How to improve your archery’ – earlier blog post). The more zombies that approach the more focused you’re going to be but you don’t want to be overwhelmed. Implement classic battle tactics – look for high ground with a good view. If there is an undead sortie make sure you aim for the head. Nice clean headshots should stop them in their tracks. It will obviously be helpful if the zombie head can be picked out against a backdrop of red, blue, black and white concentric circles to help you focus. Moving targets are tricky – aim slightly lower than your natural inclination, stay calm and try and judge the pace at which they’re moving. Try and judge it fairly quickly though. Make sure you have a good release – think smooth draw, time to aim and get that back tension going. A few lessons pre-apocalypse can do wonders here. Once you have a pile of undead don’t forget to collect your arrows. You might want to clean them at this point.
5. Repopulating the planet
Hopefully the worst hasn’t happened and you’ve managed to siphon enough gas along the way to find yourself a fabulous mountain hide-out. You’re managing to refill your fresh water supplies, you’ve got some seeds planted and a bit of fresh meat / fish available for bow-hunting. You’re keeping your head down in the hills (and keeping up your target practice). All this is looking pretty good and you’re going to eventually, hopefully start seeing less zombies. Now is the time to start repopulating planet earth. Choose your quirky band of cannon-fodder wisely. That’s all we’re saying on this one.
Start practicing with a Have a Go in London Bridge this weekend…. only £20 to secure the basics and get a ‘head-start’ on the zombies!
Lets hope you don’t see him down at London Bridge.
Chris Beckford 
Heidi 
Looking forward to hearing your ideas on ‘How to make a longbow in the event of a zombie apocalypse’. Personally I think it’s a tough decision though. Very green wood can be recurved fairly easily allowing a shorter length bow (good for manoeuvrability in the countryside), but a more traditional longbow can be made slightly faster and can be used as a long pointy stick if you let the mobile corpses get a little too close.
A subject worth some serious consideration! 😉
Long pointy sticks are the way forwards in many ways Chris… long pointy sticks that can be projected at speed are even better 🙂
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