Sleeping Bags

Sleeping bags, the second most essential bit of camping equipment? A good bag can make all the difference between waking up bright eyed or grumpy, at it’s extreme it can mean the difference between waking up and death due to hypothermia. Quite important then, I’m sure you’ll agree. As stated in other opinions, most of them come with a rating these days. Ratings for sleeping bags usually come in one of two forms, a season rating (1-5) or a temperature rating (usually +5C to –40C). These ratings can only be used as a guide to its performance, there are many variables in how warm you’ll be. Some of these factors include; are you using the bag ...

Ok, Sleeping Bags. Lets assume that the main criteria here is that you wanna be warm! Sleeping Bags come in ratings of seasons - 5 is the warmest (for use when ice climbing etc) going down to 1. If it hasn't got a rating walk away! They generally come in 2 shapes, those that are like a tube with a hood are warmer than the square "wind-tunnels"!. They use 2 types of filling - Hollow Fill or Down. These also have different ratings so check the spec! Down packs smaller but hollow fill remains warm when it's wet (as down just clumps together). Remember that sleeping bags do require replacement from time to time (& washing!!) & that ...

Gelerts Expedition 900 sleeping bag utilises Duponts ThermoLite Micro insulation to keep the bag light but warm. The bag is extremely light and fits into a small compression sack, which is supplied. The sack has webbing so that it can be compressed even further if required, although Im not too sure that long term compression would do the filling much good. For a light weightbag, it keeps me quite warm, the insulation seems to live up to its claims of "exceptional warmth to carry-weight ratio". My tent has not leaked yet, so I cant comment on the claims that it "maintains warmth when wet,dries quickly" but I ...