Last weekend I did a guys camping trip over at Green Ridge State forest again. Quite cold, and quite fun.
Camping in the cold is a pretty interesting experience. I’m glad to do it and would do it again, however there are a lot of things you have to consider. For example, how do you keep your water from freezing? What do you do if you run out of firewood? How to keep your toes warm once you get a little perspiration? How do you dry out your shoes and socks? And how many layers and sets of clothing do you need?
The temperature varied between 15 and 25F night and day. I used a combination of a 10 degree down sleeping bag and inside of that a 20 degree down sleeping bag, along with two roll-up air pads from REI. I also got to use my one-person tent for the first time and boy was it small once you have a lot of sleeping bag area and padding! I think next time I’ll lug along my two-person tent for a similar endeavor.
I’ll be a bit more prepared next time, but there were some great things learned this time. For one, I know that longer treks aren’t so good in as many layers as I had, because they really impeded on my ability to move properly. They did keep me warm though.
Also, I learned a lot about how a dog is an awesome companion. The guys had some dogs with them and taking the dogs for a really long hike with me was incredibly fun and almost serves as reason enough to have a dog. Last thing I need right now is something like that taking up my time, but if anyone ever wants to lend me a dog to go camping with I’ll gladly take your dog temporarily. He just better listen and be big enough to scare away the bears.
Congrats on a cold and fun winter camping trip. The way we’ve handled the freezing water problem is to fill all the folks Nalgene bottles with hot water before they go to bed. The Nalgene bottle acts like a hot water bottle and warms up the bottom of the sleeping bag while folks are bedding down. The body warmth in the sleeping bag prevents the water from freezing overnight. I’ve handled the clothing thing by having two sets of clothing, an active set and a passive set. After a day of exploring your active set is wet, cold and uncomfortable. Once back at camp you do a complete clothing change into you passive set (everything from your base layer to a dry socks, a fresh toque and gloves). When you are in camp, the passive clothing is composed of many layers for warmth as you won’t be getting much exercise and want to preserve your body heat. Once you are out of your boots and wearing dry socks you put on a pair of booties which keep you feet toasty. Firewood is usually situational. In some places, I fell a dead standing tree and slice it into logs before it gets dark. In the Adirondacks, when it gets cold and dark you go to bed as you can’t have fires in the interior. Any damp socks I have go into the sleeping bag at night as your body heat will dry out them out a bit. On layering, you have your base layer next to your skin, a couple of warmth layers which changes during the day based on the conditions and your activity level. The final layer is your shell which provides protection from the elements. You would typically start the day all layered up and add and subtract layers as the day evolves.