Posted: 10/9/2007 5:23:06 PM EDT
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Well it's getting that time of year. We're dipping into the upper 30's this week and will likely see freezing in a few weeks. Perfect time for camping. No bugs, no screaming kids at the campsite and no jet ski's and fast boats on the lake where I fish. I almost exclusively camp at the lake's campgrounds as it's convenient to pull the boat up on the shore and set up camp nearby. Some things that I've learned to do over the last few years of cold weather camping are: 1. Don't work up a sweat. Dress in layers and if you're getting hot take a layer off. You'll keep your temp in check vs getting super hot, sweating, then cooling down rapidly. 2. Keep a gatorade bottle in the tent at night. On the nights where the temps fall into the 20's and you've sat at the campfire and pounded a 12 pack you'll thank me. I think the worst part about cold weather camping is getting out of a warm sleeping bag to pee. The ground's usually wet, you're going to get frozen and you'll have a harder time falling back to sleep if you end up getting up 2-3 times at night. I picked this up from my buddy who drives a truck. Share your tips! |
| When I go camping here in Fla. the weather is not that bad , its almost perfect . the only problem you got is every body starts camping in the fall and winter here . but it is still great. , also put all your food in your vehicle before you go to bed , because the racoons will get it by morning |
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polypros...'nuff said there. 12 hour heater packs; throw one in your sleeping back a couple hours before bed and place by your kidney. eat soon before going to sleep. never EVER use those stupid ass free shelters that are missing a wall in a state park, just use a good tent  Speed |
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This really is a great time of year to go camping. At least around here, even the state parks are almost empty. Which can make it pretty romantic, especially if you're with your wife or girlfriend. My "tips" are: Wool socks and insulated boots for both of you. If her feet get cold, she won't be happy. Layering is really important. Avoid cotton. Buy her a pair of silk upper and lower long underwear before the trip (Campmor has some good prices) and she will be very happy. Of course you'll need warmer layers on top of that. Fleece is fine, wool sweaters, whatever, and something on top to break the wind. When your wife/girlfriend says she looks like the Michelin Man, just keep telling her how sexy she looks. People really do lose a lot of heat through the head and neck, so make sure you've got decent hats (not baseball caps) and even a scarf. Campfires are one of the best things about camping, so buy or bring LOTS of wood (cough) and a couple of comfortable camp chairs and enjoy sitting around the fire with a glass or two of wine or whatever. Bring along a pair of gloves for each of you. They don't have to be big, bulky ski gloves. Just a pair of cheap wool gloves or inserts will probably work fine for sitting around the campfire. When it's cold out, you appreciate a good meal more than when it's 80 or 90 degrees. So plan for some hearty breakfasts and good dinners. Bring along a cooler with bacon, sausage, OJ, milk, steaks, chicken, whatever you like, and eat well. The bed. Personally, I recommend a big queen sized air mattress with one or two wool blankets underneath the sleeping bags. And actually a cotton sheet on top of the wool blankets, but I'm not going to spell out why. If you have 30-degree sleeping bags and the temperatures may drop into the 20s or lower, and you don't want to buy new sleeping bags, bring along a couple old blankets or comforters or even wool blankets and put them on top of the sleeping bags. Also consider buying a couple cheap fleece blankets and putting them inside the sleeping bags. Or see if your sleeping bags will zip together. You don't want to get wet, so if it starts to rain you need to be flexible. Instead of the campfire and steak dinner, go into a town you've never been before and check out the local spots. If the temps are going to get around 20 degrees or lower, don't rely on a butane stove. If you take down your tent in the morning, don't assume it's dry just because it didn't rain. There's probably a lot of condensation in it. So either wait until it dries out before packing it up, or dry it out once you get home. A Gatorade bottle for inside-the-tent peeing?? Try an AquaTainer. Actually I just get up and go outside, and this may be the one and only time that a guy should have a pair of flip-flops handy. There is the Mr. Heater Buddy option for the tent. I've never used one but it's an option if you have half-decent ventilation. (This just reminded me of a dumb story. Six or seven years ago we did the family car camping thing, which wasn't romantic, and it got much colder than expected. We actually drove an hour into Duluth and bought a space heater and extension cord, had dinner in town, and went back to the state park and changed our campsite to one with an electric outlet, took everything down and set it up again, hooked up the space heater and slept like babies.) Maybe most importantly, remember that attitude is the most important thing. Along with a bit of a sense of humor. Just make up your minds that you're going to have a good time, and nothing, including some cold temps, is going to get in your way, and 90% of the time you'll have a good time. I realize this is oriented toward car camping, but the OP said he had a boat, so that's pretty much the same thing. |
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You're own sweat is your worst enemy. If you sweat that sweat will stay against your skin and keep pulling heat away from your body long after you've cooled down. Sweat can be uncomfortable at the least and outright dangerous. Dress using the 'onion' method. You should have a underwear/shirt layer that is made of a good synthetic that will wick away moisture. I like to have a lycra type undershirt (not great for wicking, but it's comfortable and cuts down on chaffing), long sleeved shirt, sweater and then a windbreak if I'll be active. I can peel layers as I heat up to avoid sweating. Pants are a little harder to peel and if you do it's hard to stay dry in the snow. So I'll usually skip the long underwear for my legs, wear sweat pants and then a windbreak/snow pants. I prefer wool socks, hats and mittens. I know there are a lot of good synthetic options these days but I was raised with wool. I know how it's going to preform so it's what I stick with. If you are going to be out in the snow, get a pair of good polarizing glasses. Never, ever ever make an assumption about the weather. You need to know the forecast and have a way to get an update. Either carry a weather radio or know how to recognize storm warning signs. Winter has always been my favorite time for outdoor activity. There's something satisfying about being out in sub freezing temperatures all day and still feeling warm and happy. There aren't a whole lot of good ways to stay cool in the heat, but staying warm in the cold is something we've gotten pretty good at. |
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Always pee before going to bed. It takes a lot of energy to keep urine at body temperature. Bring dry clothes to sleep in. No matter how careful you've been, your clothes have water in them after wearing them. Have snacks close to your sleeping bag. Critters shouldn't be a problem if we're really talking about cold weather. If you wake up cold, pee, then drink a little water, and eat some food. It takes TONS of energy to stay warm when it's cold. If it's REALLY cold, fill a nalgene with boiling water and put it in your bag. They don't leak and can handle boiling water fine. I've had to do this for a few scouts, and I've used it myself. Layers. Use them. Cotton kills. Good sleeping pad, not just an air mattress. I like the ridge rest deluxe from therm-a-rest. They are very thick and a good insulater between frozen ground and my butt. Has an R value of 3.1. Can't pop either. Maintain adequate airflow in your tent. No matter how freaking cold it is, make sure you have some air circulation unless you want it snowing in your tent. Bring a warmer sleeping bag than you think you'll need, especially for kids. Bring a spare sleeping bag if kids will be there so that when little billy spills water all over his bag, he doesn't die at night. IF you're car camping as a family with kids, do yourself a favor and get a propane heater for the tent. Cold kids are not happy campers. That's all I got. |
Is this actually true? Once it's at body temperature, maintaining it is assisted by the entire body acting as insulation. Since water is a somewhat effective heat mass, it doesn't seem like it would cool the body that much. I've heard both versions--that urine takes a lot of energy to keep warm, and that it doesn't matter either way. Anyone have a definitive link? |
| place one of the solar/emergengy blankets between the tent floor and your air mattress/ground pad. Gives you an extra barrier against the cold. A second one between your mattress/pad and sleeping bag will give you more added protection against night chills if needed |
I don't have any actual source, but I've done a lot of winter camping, and have always slept warmer drained. |
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Drink plenty of water. THe air is very dry and you become more dehydrated than you might think. Bring along a wool or fleece watch cap to sleep at night. That way you will be warmer but can sleep with more of your head out of the bag. Sleep with as few cloths on as possible. Buy extra long sleeping bags so you can bring your boots and water bottle to bed. Extra tall people are hosed there. Eat well. In the summer you can just satisfy your hunger with fluff. In the winter you need real calories. |
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Wear polypro, wool, or anything that wicks, underarmor cold gear etc... Remember "cotton kills". Use a pad to insulate yourself from the cold ground. As far as peeing before you beddown, I'm not sure of your body keeping urine warm and all that stuff, I'm just an IT guy. But if you pee before bed, you don't have to pee in the night, so you don't lose the warmth in your bag by getting out of it, then having to use your body heat to rewarm the bag. Also if you use a goretex bivy in near zero temperatures, the pores clog up with frost from your respiration vapours freezing, so you need to wake up and shake the bag out to keep the goretex working, you don't have to get out of the bag, just shake the top w/ you in it. |
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Change your socks before you go to bed (you don't want the day's build up of moisture cooling your toes) and wear a wool or thinsulate knit hat when you are sleeping. Be careful with Camelbacks. The hoses freeze very easily. To prevent this, blow air into the tube after every drink. Take sunglasses and sunscreen if there is any snow. Take along a little bottle of hand moisturizer if you are in a dry climate. Hands get very dry to point of the skin cracking in cold temperatures. Your lip balm should have sunscreen. Make sure your boots are big enough to wear two pairs of wool socks. Tight boots in the cold sucks worse that tight boots in general! |
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1. Crampons go OUTSIDE the pack. 2. Snowy trails mush out under hundreds of feet, then freeze to glare ice at night. Leki's, or even pointy sticks, rock. 3. Save weight by adding one set of insulation layer, top and bottom, to your planned dayclothes. You get an extra layer, good for 20-30 degrees lower temps, a backup layer for the slowest to dry layer if you fall in the creek, AND dry sleepwear. 4. If your feet are cold, put on another hat. 5. Twenty or thirty pushups, inside your bag, before you change and before you exit in the mornings. 6. MARK the pee bottle in BRAILLE. A 2l Nalgene is good for ONE go...ALMOST, but not quite, two. You DO understand the implications of "not quite" right? 7. Figure your fuel requirements for the itinerary, then add one extra cannister, below 20 degrees F. You'll need to swap them back and forth, one melting snow, the other warming inside your jacket, as they de-gas. WAY better than having to wait on priming a liquid fuel stove, and MUCH safer if cooking in your tent. 8. Figure on 3-4 degrees lower ambient temps per thousand feet of elevation gain. 9. At night, cold air spills off higher elevations and pools in basins. Half to a third way up a slope, on a bench, protected from wind, is about as warm a site as you'll find in a given region. The sun rises in the east, site your tent acordingly. 10. On snow or ice, don't forget to sunscreen the underside of your jaw, and your nose, and keep your mouth shut. 11. If your feet freeze, keep your boots on till you get out. The back of your neck is a good place for a quick hand warm-up, and someone else's belly might work for feet. 12. Stay familiar with the symptoms and phases of hypothermia and frostbite. Partner up and WATCH your partner, judgement can be the first thing to go. 13. Alcohol and nicotine are NOT your friends at low temps. LOTS of water, and make sure you fuel the furnace befopre you turn in. Having a snack bedside will help warm you if you wake up cold. It is up to YOU to reconcile eating and cooking in the tent with bear country common sense. 14. An air mattress with a hole in it has an R value of 0.0000000013. 15. You can stamp out a tent pad on deep snow with your snowshoes as much as you want, but it WILL NOT hold you long enough to take a pee with them off. 16. A tent is not a tent unless there's a 99 cent sponge in the tent bag, checked before departure. 17. To guy a tent in high winds, theory requires a point fixed in three dimensional space halfway up each pole, and at the apex too, if possible. Minimum rope for a four sided tent is one long piece, one short. The long one begins at a guy point, halfway up a pole. Down and over to a stake or deadman (voluminous object buried in snow), or tree midpoint from the middle of that tent wall, 45 degree angle, up to the next guy point, down to the next anchor midway along next wall, etc. from above, you would see the rope form a 4 point star. The short rope makes an X inside the tent. If these aren't in the bag, checked before departure, you don't really have a tent. 18. Shovel, beacon and probe in avy territory, no exceptions. 19. Pocket management for critical gear when swapping layers every five minutes can make or break your trip, and even kill you if you aren't careful. All layers need to be stored close at hand when not on. 20. In variable conditions above treeline, begin your layers with a swimsuit, under your base layer. You'll thank me when the temp spikes to 80 and you either have to keep both your base layer and long pants on, or else flash everyone within 50 miles. 21. When melting snow, fill the pot one third to one half with liquid water first. You CAN burn snow. 22. On trail, fill your nalgene with snow if it gets below a quarter full. White snow, scrape away the surface first, and it'll melt in your pack if the temps aren't too low. Much faster than stopping to stove melt a drink. 23. Black absorbs heat best, bright red is easier to spot from a SAR helo. You pays your money and you takes your chances. 24. Extra batteries. |
+1, I look like a big chapped assed tomato after a few days hiking in winter. Hands, face, ect. 
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Just a few tips: Don't get wet; don't fall into a creek, get caught in the rain, etc. IF you do, get dry and out of the elements ASAP. Being wet with the wrong clothes on will kill you sure as a bullet to the brain. Stay hydrated. Its common for folks to forgo drinking water when its cold outside because the thought of drinking cold water makes one feel even colder. Not staying hydrated is just gonna cause lots of problems down the road. Practice camping out in the cold for a night or two just to check out your gear once you get it that you have for cold weather survival. |
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A good LAYERING technique for clothing with a base (next to skin) clothing using polyester and/or wool blends. Smartwool heavy weight socks. Windpro hat that covers ears for day. Thick fleece hat to cover head at night (40% of all body heat is lost through the head area). Goretex or eVENT fabric for outer shell if it is raining, sleeting or snowing. Gaitors if the ground is very wet or snow covered. EXTRA socks, underwear and EXTRA dry socks to wear to bed at night. AC |
RE the above in red....  All the above is good advise. |
Braille is an excellent idea - something to make it very obvious in the dark what's what. For daytime, I also note that my "chamber pot" Nalgene is the only red Nalgene I own, and it's stored separately from everything else (tied, empty, to the back of the pack). It is indeed good for only once. For those who boil water, a Nalgene makes a good hot water bottle for, say, your feet inside the bag, too. Note: Debates over warmth aside, this is a major reason to urinate prior to going to bed. |
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Zip lock bags - quart and gallon size for DRY clothing Wake up early, stoke the fire, break out the JetBoil or hiker's stove and fire it up to boil a Nagalene of hot water to make tea or hot coco (or coffee). Then bring the termos cup of the hot stuff to your GF when she's still in the sleeping bag. This will score you points, lots of points.  Don't forget toilet paper, wet wipes, and a towel |
Sounds dem. to me. Directly contradictory to the advice. 
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Good advice above, except for the Nageline for peeing. Use a gateraid bottle to be different then any drinking bottle. Keep hydrated! If you are using a air file mattress, you must have a blanket between you and the bed. Otherwise you could just sleep on the ground. |
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Well, if you are going to use one of those three sided cabin/lean to's of the gubmint, you will have a ton of air space to heat. One time with 6 of us we made a 6 foot by 4 foot bonfire in front of the lean to. The lean to acted as a reflector and was pretty comfortable. This is much better than the idea of putting a tarp over the front of the lean to and trying to heat (kill yourself) with a tent heater, hobo stove, or silly ass candles. I've seen people do that with some poor results. Another thing we did in the military during (non tactical) winter training is to have two fires near eachother, yes it's twice the work but if you have the fuel go for it. The benefit is you get radiant heat from both sides and saves you from rotating like the chicken rotisserie at the supermarket. Was pretty damn cozy. or the Sgt. Osteen method- two poncho lean to's facing eachother with a bon fire in the middle and packing them in like sardines. Wind direction was down the middle between the two hooches to draw the smoke away. IIRC we piled a metric assload of leaves on the poncho leantos to hold some heat in (reflect back on us). Another biggee- guard your water from freezing. It really sucks to have a GI canteen popsicle when your snowshoeing and pulling an akio (sledboat/tobagan). I've seen an reserve o4 melt his canteen trying to undo that. (his day job was nuclear engineer so go figure )If you got snow and you're tenting don't have your door upwind obviously and also not directly downwind as this is where it will drift/drop snow. Set up so the door is at a 45 deg angle downwind or so from the wind direction. |
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1. eat and take with you high cholesterol foods. cholesterol is antifreeze for body cells. Bacon, butter, heavy cream, nuts, seeds. When you cook bacon, save the grease and use it for cooking other stuff. added benefit; if you are the cook for others, they will eat every bit of it and rave about it. 2. wear a real cold weather hat, preferably one made out of a dead sheep 3. have a wool scarf or neck sock, keep neck covered (for warmth as needed), and for putting over mouth to keep from breathing cold air (when needed). quit whining about wool being itchy. you want to itch or freeze? he5. may sound simple, but... if you get cold move around. if you don't move around, you will start dying. Find work to do, cut wood, split wood, etc., won't be cold long. 6. be very careful of sweating 7. after in the cold a few days, you will get used to it, and it will feel normal. after you have accomplished this, stay out of warm areas. e.g. don't go into a warm house and watch the game etc. for a few hours, stay outside. 8. drink plenty of water. easy to dehydrate in the cold 9. have a big treat at the end of the day, for me it's ONE glass of wine, or ONE beer, or a desert like a real piece of pie, or ONE smoke. (yes, I know, just be careful) 10. know your limitations |
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Well here are a couple I haven't seen posted yet... 1- I take my clothes off at night to sleep but keep them in the sleeping bag with me at night. They can be a pillow and extra insulation around the feet... And the best part is you put on warm clothes in the morning instead of cold clothes. 2- You can take rocks that were heated up very close to or next to a fire and put them around your bag or burry them under your bag to radiate heat. Carefull not to melt your bag or tent. Use a little common sense with this one. But a rock will hold the heat for awhile. |