I am what they call a "hot" sleeper. This summer, when my wife and I were amassing camping gear, I tried out many sleeping bags. Right away I determined that I could not, would not ever be comfortable in a standard mummy-style sleeping bag. I'm just too chunky. We bought a couple of 20º "three season" sleeping bags (I actually wound up with a small collection) and took them camping.
The first lesson that I learned was that a bag rate to 20º is a pretty warm thing! I'm not sure what the third season was supposed to be, but summer was not one of them! I could sleep inside none of the bags that I had collected: they were simply much too warm! Of course the nights were too cold to sleep un-covered though. Luckily, one of my bags was a square one that you could un-zip and use as a quilt. Un-luckily, it was down and the feathers got scrunched and soaked from my perspiration and condensation inside the tent.
Lesson two: when one needs a sleeping bag (you know, when it's actually cold out side), the last thing one worries oneself with is how snug the bag fits them! The only thing the matters is how warm the thing is. Suddenly I was confronted with a collection of sleeping bags that, during the summer, I had become sure would perform to their rated temps and more. In the winter... not so much. I zipped, wrapped and wriggled into all of them in an effort to find the best one. None of them. Each had a "flaw". I settled on my GI surplus bivy-bag set up with a cheep fleece liner. I only had the patrol bag, not the intermittent cold bag. On a side note: the flap of the bivy that bothered me so much during summer testing was 100% un-noticable in December.
I had a great weekend and slept warm and comfortable but I learned my lesson about "sizing" sleeping bags: tight is right!
The first lesson that I learned was that a bag rate to 20º is a pretty warm thing! I'm not sure what the third season was supposed to be, but summer was not one of them! I could sleep inside none of the bags that I had collected: they were simply much too warm! Of course the nights were too cold to sleep un-covered though. Luckily, one of my bags was a square one that you could un-zip and use as a quilt. Un-luckily, it was down and the feathers got scrunched and soaked from my perspiration and condensation inside the tent.
Lesson two: when one needs a sleeping bag (you know, when it's actually cold out side), the last thing one worries oneself with is how snug the bag fits them! The only thing the matters is how warm the thing is. Suddenly I was confronted with a collection of sleeping bags that, during the summer, I had become sure would perform to their rated temps and more. In the winter... not so much. I zipped, wrapped and wriggled into all of them in an effort to find the best one. None of them. Each had a "flaw". I settled on my GI surplus bivy-bag set up with a cheep fleece liner. I only had the patrol bag, not the intermittent cold bag. On a side note: the flap of the bivy that bothered me so much during summer testing was 100% un-noticable in December.
I had a great weekend and slept warm and comfortable but I learned my lesson about "sizing" sleeping bags: tight is right!
