Bag test

I inherited a ski suit from the brother in law so I thought I’d try and see if I can get away with not buying a new more-wintery-than-the-winter-one-I’ve-got sleeping bag.

So as last night had hopes of being a cold night I slept out with just a self-inflating mattress, my winterish sleeping bag (rated to 0°C) and me dressed in longjohn bottoms, a T-shirt, a Decathlon skinny fleece, even skinnier cotton sox probably marks & sparks, a skinny balaclava and no hat and said ski suit.

When I got in the temperature was –3.8 and within minutes I had my arms outside the bag and the zip down, hood off helping to warm the planet. Minus five point something had my arms back inside (aided by the dog who would insist on licking my hands) and the zip up and it really was comfortable, in fact I slept right through till about 4 when I began to feel a little chilly and the urges of nature had me cooling off rapidly whilst painting a bush with willy water below a spectacularly limpid sky. The temperature was minus 8 but the only really cold bit was my nose. Had it not been for the bulging bladder I might not have woken up at all.

Actually, though the filling in the bag is synthetic it might not have simply been the temperature that chillied me up as I noticed that the outside of the sleeping bag was pretty wet with skyjuice which probably reduced insulation a bit.

What I really need is to try this in the tent but with lower temperatures but there doesn’t seem to be much hope of things going below minus eight as up until now the lowest it has gone is a pathetically wimpish minus seven. I mean, I don’t really intend to rough it in the mountains without a tent so a tent test would be more realistic.

Tonight, no ski suit but two sleeping bags the winter one inside the summer one to see if that’s any warmer. Forecast is snow though which might put an end to the test early.

Probably much easier just to buy a better sleeping bag rated maybe to minus ten and have done with it. But hey, it’s a good excuse to sleep out.