Hungry Jack
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Post by Hungry Jack on Jan 20, 2020 15:18:51 GMT -8
I purchased this mid-weight base layer bottom a few weeks at Real Cheap Sports in Ventura. Finally tested them out today in Chicago, with good results. Little Hungry and I went sledding. Temps were about 30, but with a stiff north breeze. I wore the bottoms under a pair of laminated, non-insulated waterproof ski pants, so I had decent wind protection but little thermal protection on the outside.
No matter. My legs were comfortably warm the entire 2+ hours we were out. I spend a fair amount of time standing around, and never felt cold.
I purchased these for my Aravaipa (AZ--about 3,000 ft above sea level) trip next month, where I expect overnight temps in the mid-30s. I will use them in camp under a nylon pant/shell, and for hammock sleeping. I will be plenty warm in these in camp and while sleeping.
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gabby
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Post by gabby on Jan 20, 2020 15:56:39 GMT -8
This stuff is so much an individual thing, it's hard to know what to say. In the conditions you describe, I'd probably - assuming I wasn't wet - be okay with silkweight under just about anything at all. But my lower body doesn't get cold in the 30s. For me, it's my upper body: torso, neck and, especially, my upper arms. God knows why. We're all different. OTOH, I tend to sleep cold, and my feet are extremely critical to my comfort, so much so that I normally wear socks even at home in bed. Even in the summer, I wear socks when it's 80+ degrees outside. In addition, we're relatively cheap about our A/C and furnace, though the wife virtually demands that the A/C be at (at least) 72 at night through the entire summer. (She gets "hot flashes".)
Bottom line (I think): everybody's different. True midweight (assuming here we're talking about the same thing) would make me too warm in the 30s.
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zeke
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Post by zeke on Jan 20, 2020 17:25:53 GMT -8
I agree with gabby. I'd be too hot at 30º in any mid I have used, even just standing around. I am always on the warm side. I sleep under just a sheet while my wife has blanket on and the AC set to 74º. (Yeah, not sure why the AC has to be set so low she needs a blanket.) In my hammock, any thin layer works just fine. I sometimes need to shed even that layer when the temps are above 50º. My quilt alone does just fine down to about 50º |
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Hungry Jack
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Post by Hungry Jack on Jan 20, 2020 17:42:00 GMT -8
This stuff is so much an individual thing, it's hard to know what to say. In the conditions you describe, I'd probably - assuming I wasn't wet - be okay with silkweight under just about anything at all. But my lower body doesn't get cold in the 30s. For me, it's my upper body: torso, neck and, especially, my upper arms. God knows why. We're all different. OTOH, I tend to sleep cold, and my feet are extremely critical to my comfort, so much so that I normally wear socks even at home in bed. Even in the summer, I wear socks when it's 80+ degrees outside. In addition, we're relatively cheap about our A/C and furnace, though the wife virtually demands that the A/C be at (at least) 72 at night through the entire summer. (She gets "hot flashes".) Bottom line (I think): everybody's different. True midweight (assuming here we're talking about the same thing) would make me too warm in the 30s. So, your feet get cold in summer when it's 80 degrees, but in a 20 degree windchill you just need a pair of silk longjohns? |
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Hungry Jack
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Post by Hungry Jack on Jan 20, 2020 17:43:40 GMT -8
I agree with gabby . I'd be too hot at 30º in any mid I have used, even just standing around. I am always on the warm side. I sleep under just a sheet while my wife has blanket on and the AC set to 74º. (Yeah, not sure why the AC has to be set so low she needs a blanket.) In my hammock, any thin layer works just fine. I sometimes need to shed even that layer when the temps are above 50º. My quilt alone does just fine down to about 50º With your hammock, at what temp do you break out the underquilt? Do you sleep on a closed cell pad? |
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zeke
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Post by zeke on Jan 20, 2020 17:48:18 GMT -8
Hungry Jack I never break out an under-q. I mostly use a pad under me, in my WBBB dbl layer. That is all the under insulation I need. Never sprung for the cost of an under, since my pads worked so well for me. Currently, that pad is an old thermarest. Thinking about this, I am baffled by my own behavior. I have spent many $$$ lightening my pack, but steered away from an under-q because I had some perfectly good pads that weighed twice or 3 x what the quilt would. Now, I am surprised I never bought the under-q.
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driftwoody
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Post by driftwoody on Jan 20, 2020 18:13:04 GMT -8
Finally tested them out today in Chicago, with good results. Little Hungry and I went sledding. Temps were about 30, but with a stiff north breeze. Must be warmer in 60657 closer to the lake. Didn't get close to 30 here in 60516. |
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Hungry Jack
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Post by Hungry Jack on Jan 20, 2020 18:21:35 GMT -8
Finally tested them out today in Chicago, with good results. Little Hungry and I went sledding. Temps were about 30, but with a stiff north breeze. Must be warmer in 60657 closer to the lake. Didn't get close to 30 here in 60516. The car said 30 when we parked at Montrose sled hill. That's probably not super accurate, but close enough. We had a bit of sun too, although you could see the lake effect clouds built up on the south shore. It probably was snowing pretty good in Indiana. I was expecting it to be much colder today, but the crusted snow was actually starting to soften a tad when we broke off for a late lunch. |
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driftwoody
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Post by driftwoody on Jan 20, 2020 18:30:56 GMT -8
The slushy snow freezing overnight with single digit temps reminded me of a similar but more extreme phenomenon more than 40 years ago when I was at SIU-C. Every little slope was a solid slide for fun on your butt, a cafeteria tray, or on your feet if you could stay upright.
Now I regret staying inside yesterday!
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gabby
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Post by gabby on Jan 20, 2020 18:45:33 GMT -8
So, your feet get cold in summer when it's 80 degrees, but in a 20 degree windchill you just need a pair of silk longjohns? Not enough detail in that post, which is - surprise! - extremely strange for me, I think. (King of TMI) My feet always get cold, just more so in winter. (Pls don't tell me if you know this to be a symptom of something fatal.) In summer, a lot depends on whether or not my "her thermostat is broken" wife is around. If she's not, I can twiddle the thermostat and go without (sometimes). In fact, I'd much rather sleep "in the buff": au naturel; nekkid; "wearing a smile" and comfortable as hell. If she's home and has control of the thermostat, I wear at least one pair of socks, though I can usually get away with cotton in the summer. OTOH, I hardly ever wear underwear in bed, and only a shirt: short sleeve cotton in summer, long sleeve polyester (or polyester mix) in winter, sometimes (maybe that's really "often") layered with a cotton tee. I also have been known to wear a "head ornament" in winter, running up to and including a balaclava, but mostly a light skullcap or beanie. (I have a "semi-bare" pate, you see.) At home, I have a spare fleece blanket for when the temps (very rarely here) get below the mid 30s. When that happens, I still wear nothing else below the belt other than socks, simply putting the fleece blankie under the sheet. Of course, this is usually only if the wife decides to "take advantage" of the temperature dip and let the thermostat "float", which she has done. I usually counter with, "You know, honey, you're jeopardizing the outer wall plumbing when you do that." Of course, that's only happened once, back in the 80s, when it got into the teens in Austin and froze the pipes in the outside walls where the builder skimped on insulation - and snowed 12" in San Antonio. Good times, long before "global worming" kicked in real hard. In winter, I wear 3 layers of socks. My current configuration is: 1) polyester-lycra toe socks, 2) liner socks, then 3) Smartwool Expeditions. I wear down booties below about 25 degrees (in a tent), though that varies. There are still nights when I get the creeps wearing socks. (I can't explain it.) The toe socks really help with between-the-toe blisters. (My feet are a bleedin' mess!) Okay, I know it's strange: my ankles and up never seem to get cold. I once walked to a campsite (after arriving late, around 10 PM) in ~30 degree weather in shorts, though I was wearing 2 shirts layered and a down jacket, as well as a hat (leather). I didn't feel cold until I got camp set up and crawled into my tent. Thinking about this, I am baffled by my own behavior. I have spent many $$$ lightening my pack, but steered away from an under-q because I had some perfectly good pads that weighed twice or 3 x what the quilt would. Now, I am surprised I never bought the under-q. I hear that. Sometimes, I can't explain my behavior. It happens more often when I imbibe. ETA: Oh, yeah: TMI is back! |
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rebeccad
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Post by rebeccad on Jan 20, 2020 19:09:22 GMT -8
gabby, I also suffer from very cold feet (I also hate sleeping in socks, and have taken to wearing my down socks to bed just until the first hot flash warms up my feet). When I'm up and about, In find that keeping my legs warmer helps (a little) to keep my feet from freezing. So I wear long tights biking in any temps under mid-50s. P.S. All this talk reminds me that my feet are #$%#$ frozen right now. It's 65 at my end of the house (probably 2 or 3 degrees warmer in the hall where the thermostat is. I've taken to pushing it up a bit so the parts of the house we actually live in will be warmer).
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Post by cweston on Jan 22, 2020 6:46:31 GMT -8
A pair of Terramar synthetic bottoms (not sure what they are called, but maybe they are lighter than "midweight?") have been my goto for summer mountain BPing for years. I use them as described in the OP: under rain pants in camp in the evening and as "pajamas."
I have found, though, that they acquire synthetic funk stink really easily if you actually sweat in them.
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gabby
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Post by gabby on Jan 22, 2020 10:14:11 GMT -8
More detail, after thinking about this a bit. (You may freely laugh at my stupidity at any time during the following - but try to keep it down, please! I'm sensitive!)In addition, the following might be considered totally irrelevant to the current thread subject. But it helps to further qualify what I said before, I think. Way back in the day, when I was convinced that I was planning an epic PCT adventure (circa early 2000s), I figured that there might be some fairly cold river/creek crossings and some "postholing" while traversing snowfields at altitude. Okay, I'm hearing the laughter: Guys, hear me out: I had been reading a lot for my (ultimately aborted) trip - journals and books and such - and had figured that, like that I'd barely (literally! see below) experienced to that point, the water would be spring snow runoff and would be, well, a little cold, and there might be these "snow bridges" with cold water beneath, etc., etc. - Ain't I imaginative!?!- and I'd need something a bit heavier for the crossings, falling through snow to cold water, "postholing", etc., that would both insulate and do so while wet. So I spent some time looking around and thinking about the problem. ( With both limited experience & a very small brain.) Mind, the only stream crossings or "snowfield traversals" I'd ever experienced to that point were on trips to Colorado in the 80s in the late springtime/early summer, when I'd be wearing jeans ( OK, I can actually hear the belly laughs now! Come on!) and boots with a single pair of cheap socks from the local big box dept. store, and no gaiters. I'd subsequently slept out in cold in the teens, and rarely needed much more than my Thermasilk "jammies" (top and bottom), the usual overkill "socks and down booties" on my feet, a hat and (sometimes, rarely) a light, thin synthetic jacket inside my sleeping bag (for leaks, high wind & unexpected cold snaps). All this happened, usually, in what was a "wind leaky" 3 season Tarptent-like arrangement during my "pretrek" testing phase. So, with all that in mind, what I bought for "extra, in case I need it" (words "ultralighters" aren't ever supposed to use), and all those anticipated situations above in which I might get both cold and wet, was a pair of Mysterioso M-Tech Pants. The damned things were almost $100, even then, but I found a pair in clearance/closeout at REI in their "paddling & kayaking" area. From the REI website (they no longer have these, but the pants are considered to be "paddling pants" and can be had, I think, from places like this which sell diving and paddling gear. (Coast Outdoors in Canada, but also in other places like Florida, from whence I remember I also got a pair of killer, zippered, neoprene "diving booties" for much the same reasons as stated above - I easily succumb to "overkill"! God help me. Features
- Wicks moisture away from your skin and offers 4-way stretch for a comfortable, body-hugging fit worn alone or worn under a wetsuit
- Polartec Power Stretch continues to insulate even when wet
- Quick-drying, breathable Power Stretch is constructed with an abrasion-resistant nylon/Lycra® outer surface and soft, velour-finish fleece inside
- Comfortable elastic waist with drawcord; flat-lock stitching to prevent chafing
- Treated to resist growth of odor-causing bacteria
- SPF 50 rating
So, when I say I "only really need a thin pair of silkweight underwear" (for sleeping, campsite lounging and really cold walking), what I really mean is "I also take these, "just in case" (more words "ultralighters" aren't ever supposed to use) I have to go through any of those aforementioned situations, and if the weather turns nasty - or if I just feel cold. FYI: I am not Dan'l Boone. Or Davy Crockett. Summary:So (to conclude with full disclosure), though I almost always use the silkweights I mentioned before as insulation and "jammies", I also have these when it's cold ... or I'm cold. I really don't like being cold. Coincidentally, I see that I'm cold right now, 'cause the wife is sleeping late, and the thermostat is "set back" every morning for that eventuality ...
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rebeccad
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Post by rebeccad on Jan 23, 2020 9:25:16 GMT -8
BTW, while I almost always sleep just in my light-weight long undies I almost always carry fleece pants, which I wear under my rain pants in the evening to stay warm. They then serve as a pillow, unless temps drop into the 20s, in which case I probably end up wearing them in bed. So I’m not going to make fun of Gabby and his extra longies! I also dislike being cold.
But I heat up like a flpping furnace as soon as I start moving, so I never hike in either—just in my basic nylon hiking pants, with rain pants over them as needed (i.e., when it’s raining).
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Hungry Jack
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Post by Hungry Jack on Jan 23, 2020 10:07:37 GMT -8
A pair of Terramar synthetic bottoms (not sure what they are called, but maybe they are lighter than "midweight?") have been my goto for summer mountain BPing for years. I use them as described in the OP: under rain pants in camp in the evening and as "pajamas." I have found, though, that they acquire synthetic funk stink really easily if you actually sweat in them. I bought the 2.0 grade (they go 1-2-3), which they claim is suitable to 25 degrees. From my view, it’s a valid rating. I bought them to replace an old pair of Columbia fleece pants, which served their purpose but were quite bulky. |
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