There is an old hunting lodge halfway up the mountains, about thirty miles away from the city.
When I was a kid my dad used to take me there.
He said his dad had built it, but I actually don’t know the legal status of the place. As far as I know it is entirely off the grid. After I got evicted, and had a lot of bill collectors breathing down my neck, I decided that going off the grid was a great idea. I smashed my cell phone, collected what money I could, and went to live in that hunting lodge for a while. That ended up being 8 months, and in that time I learned a lot about heating, hunting, and survival. The four main elements of survival are shelter, heating, water, and food, in that order! Since I had shelter all taken care of I could focus on the next step, which is not just building a fire, but making sure I had a consistent source of heating for the months to come. Building a fire is easy, but heating a cabin for days, or even weeks, on end requires a lot of manual labor. I had to chop and stack wood, as well as dissemble the furnace for a thorough cleaning before I used it. Once I had a reliable heating source I could find a ready source of clean water. Another reason heating is so important is to boil water. Because drinking stagnant water without boiling it can make you very sick. Heating also lets me cook my food.