40° underquilt + 40° sleeping bag = ?

[Beckerbrain]

It’s a new experience for you, so treat it like an experiment. Don’t try and narrow it down to as few items as possible right away. Bring some extra insurance along so you can mix and match to see what works for you. We are all different and some hands on experience with gear on the trail is priceless! Learn what you can from others. Then when you have opportunities like this, learn your own unique style and needs by running your own trials on the trail when you have opportunities like this!




This is outstanding advice. We will be “car camping” 95% of the trip, as it’s sort of a road trip more than a typical camping trip, so this will be the perfect opportunity to experiment in cold weather (I live in southeastern FL so I don’t get much opportunity to experiment in really cold weather) and bring a ton of redundant gear. I’m going to be in the market for a more dedicated winter UQ at some point soonish, as there’s a possibility I could be living in NC for a few months if this new Work project happens, but I want to play around and get more experienced before I drop a few hundred bones on such a single purpose piece of gear. Thanks for the advice and the reassurance!! I love this forum

For example, you could bring plenty of warm clothes AND a pad AND some extra quilts AND some hand warmers AND a space blanket AND a warm water container to sleep with AND some extra food for dinner AND maybe the fleece blanket too. You won’t need it all, but you will learn much quicker and be more confident in your decisions to cut out some gear in the end because you had those options on hand when you could’ve used them, but didn’t and won’t stress about all the what-if’s for so long.

That’s my style, HYOH and have fun learning!


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[Latt]

I had my first pod nights a month ago and it was awesome. Sure you limit your diagonal lay, but honestly it's worth it in order to stay warm.

I was in 10f / -6c temps and used the following setup (and was honestly a bit too warm most of the time):
Hammock: Dutch half-wit which I had turned around (feet in bugnet and head free) - No bugs in these temps so nice to have your head out in the open.
UQ: Warbonnet Wookie 3-season (20-degree)
TQ: 0f UK hammocks custom
Pod: Snugpak Elite 4 sleeping bag
Clothes worn: Cumulus down pants, PHD -25c jacket ... plus baselayers ... and a pair of -50c mitts which ended up on my feet the first night, cause I went to bed with cold feet.

I was sleeping with the pod open to my below my chest and with the TQ kicked down so it was only around my feet. I could've probably taken this system down to -10f / -23c - But the last couple of years I have been cold on this trip, so this was well worth it. I'd rather have to vent and have constricted diagonal lay, than be cold