How to Start Winter Camping: Build a Winter Sleep System on a Budget
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Hey travelers! Welcome to another video. My name is Jeremy, The Wayward Traveler. If this is your first time here and you want to learn more about outdoor adventure and awesome gear then this is the place for you!
I have a confession to make. I started backpacking when I was 13 years old and since that time all those years of backpacking, camping, and outdoor adventure, I’ve never been winter backpacking or winter camping. I’ve always wanted to, I’ve always had that desire to, and every single time the opportunity came up, I came up with some excuse not to do it. That ends today.
If 2020 has taught me anything, it’s that you can’t take anything for granted. Learn a new skill, go on an adventure.
With that being said, I’m going to tackle learning to winter backpack in the same systematic approach that I took to ultralight backpacking.
The first thing I’m going to do is look at my sleep system. A lot of people break a sleep system into shelter and sleep system. To me they are very much intertwined - you can’t have a comfortable sleep system without a bomb-proof shelter. So I roll shelter and sleep system together.
Looking at the gear that I have, I have exactly one tent that is 3/4 season tent that I would feel comfortable starting winter backpacking and that is this 20 year old behemoth. It is a Sierra Designs Omega CD. This is one of my first backpacking tents that I purchased. I’ve been on several adventures early on with this. It's been a great tent for me, but I’ve never actually tested it out in the snow and we’re going to do that tonight.
The second thing is having a sleeping pad with an R-Value that’s appropriate for the temperatures in which you’re going to be sleeping. Looking at this REI Trekker sleeping pad here has an R-Value of 1.75. I don’t think this is going to meet the need for me in any way so I’m going to chuck that to the side.
I have this…oh this is probably 20 years old too. This is an old Mountain Hardwear Backcountry 60. This is kinda bomb-proof in the fact it has this water-proof cover, it’s a closed cell pad, super comfortable, not lightweight by any stretch. This might be a contender. I’ll at least have this in the tent with me.
My current sleep pad is this Expedition Equipment SynMat Ultralight 7. It’s long and wide. It weighs 20.9 ounces. It has an R-Value of 3.1. For me, it’s super comfortable. It’s not the lightest sleeping mat on the market especially with some of the new ones out there - I may be looking at replacing this relatively soon, but this is what I would like to try to sleep on tonight. Obviously an R-Value of 3.1 isn’t going to do it so I’m going to try to pair with this old guy. This is a Thermarest Ridgerest. It has an R-Value of 2.1 so combined it gives me an R-Value of 5.2 which may still be a little low which is why I’m going to have the Mountain Hardwear Backcountry with me.
Sleeping bag-wise. My standard sleeping back is this Marmot Helium 850 fill down. It’s a regular. I believe it has a temperature rating - let’s see if it says it on here - I believe this is a 15 degree bag. I will have to double check that. Which is going to be right at where we’re going to be at tonight. I’m really going to be testing the limitations of this bag. I’ll also likely have skin-out-wise a medium or heavy weight bottom, a medium or heavy weight wool top, obviously wool socks, a buff or balacava, and possibly even a hat. We’ll see what we pair that with. We’ll certainly going to be testing it’s limits tonight. Which is also why I’ll be pairing it with this lightweight bivy sack.
So the next step: where am I going to do this? I want to control as many variables as I can. So for that reason, I’m going to go right out to my backyard and chose a campsite.
Alright, it’s time to chose our campsite for tonight. It’s about 30 degrees right now. A decent wind coming from the west which is pretty typical for this part of Idaho. So now, just like any time you are picking camp, what I’m looking for is a relatively flat spot that I can set up with the back of the tent toward the wind. Which is going to be that way. I think this area out here is going to be just fine for my needs for tonight. As you can see, I’m steps away from my back porch in case anything goes sideways and I need to bail on the experiment - that’s a nice safety-net to have especially when you’re developing new skills and getting comfortable with a brand new system.
The first thing I need to do here is tamp down this snow. As you can see, here we have 3-4 inches of snow. I don’t want to be sinking into the snow after I get my tent set up. So what I’m going to do is come out here, find that flat-ish spot that I want, and now I’m going to tamp down an area for my tent.
Well we have our sleep system. We have the Thermarest on the bottom, followed by the inflatable pad, bivy sack, and sleeping bag inside the bivy sack. Now originally I had wanted to do the bivy sack and then everything inside. This Equinox bivy just isn’t large enough to do that so I’m going to try to make due with this and see what happens. But being in here and out of the wind, I’m feeling pretty good about this. I think this will work out just fine. We will see. So this is the home for tonight. Let’s take a look outside - get my shoes back on.
Here we are. Home for the night. I’m feeling pretty good about this set up. Now remember this is my first time sleeping out in the snow so take that with a grain of salt. We’ll see what the morning brings. I’ll see you when I get inside.
Well here’s home for the night. Alright, here we are. I’m nestled into the Sierra Designs Omega CD. I’m wearing a light-weight Smartwool bottom and a light-weight Smartwool top and then this mid-weight three-quarter zip. I’m already a little warm, so I’ll be taking off this shortly before going to bed. I’m also wearing a Smartwool cap and a fleece buff, both of which may also come off until I actually need them. So far, I’m feeling pretty comfortable. We’re in the mid-20s which is a little bit warmer than what I was expecting. I have high hopes for my first sleeping on snow experience. I’ll let you know how it goes in the morning.
