Dry sack for swimming with your pack on…

Ryan,

I've gone on several trips where I've swum with my pack and even submerged it completely when using it as a float. To keep my gear dry I've put everything in two trash compactor bags within the backpack main compartment. To seal the bags I just twist to tops, fold over, and secure with a rubber band. Do this at each trash bag.

In the photo below I'm pretty sure I'm sitting on my pack. My friend brought the big yellow dry bag and all of his stuff got wet.

Have you considered picking up one of the BPL Arctic 1000 packs? Not cheap, but certainly waterproof and low water absorption. Maybe not the best answer for technical canyoneering, or where your pack sees a lot of rough treatment that could cause a puncture in the integral dry sack. If you go the waterproof sack inside of a pack route, make sure you have drain holes at the bottom. Also, the POE dry sacks used in the Arctic can be purchased separately.

POE Pneumo 50. It's a perfect fit (in particular, shape) for 50-ish liter packs. In contrast, the 65-liter is not such a great fit.

The Pneumo is probably better than the Pneumo LTW due to the amount of abuse that's inherent to canyoneering.

Have you seen this site?

http://canyoneeringusa.com/shop/home.php?cat=257

Theres a podcast from Jason Lichter, who did 10,000 miles of hiking in a year a few years back about his swimming experiment on this site, he brings up a stuffsack, which i can't remember as well as a bunch of other useful stuff. I think its 18 minutes long.

How many mil thick is your trash compactor bag? Any particular brand, seems you've got just the right thickness and brand of bag to do what you did. How many gallon capacity?

I use the POE Pneumo LTW series of dry bags. They have an air valve (purge valve) that you can use as a compression sack (sqeeze all tha air out, then close the valve) or as a float bag (inflate the bag, then close the valve).

The bags a not designed for heavy abuse but, IMHO, they are not fragile either. If you use one inside a backpack with approprate fabric for cayoneering, I don't think you will have a problem.

I have used them successfully on kayaking trips and hiking in Florida's swamps where there are sawgrass, some yucca type spiked plants and occasional Hawthorn.

Roleigh,

I don't remember the brand or thickness of the trash compactor bags I used on that trip, but I don't think it matters. They are all about the same size and thickness.

I think trash compactor bags are at least 2 mil thickness.

I've also used the POE dry sacks. They're great. I've even used them in the bottom of a very wet kayak and my stuff stayed dry. I'd feel very comfortable swimming with my gear in one.

My 2.5L weighs 6.1oz. A little heavy, but if your gear MUST stay dry, this is an acceptable weight to me.

And for a double use you can inflate it and use it as a pillow.

I should clarify that I will most likely be using my GoLite Pinnacle (or Jam2 if I can fit everything I need in it). Without drain holes in the bottom, I might have a problem right? Water is sure to get in the roll-top opening, and then hang out down there at the bottom until I empty out my pack and empty the water. That could get very heavy!

Thoughts? Am I off base? Also, I am using a down quilt, lows are supposed to hit 38*… so yeah… I better keep things dry.

If you absolutely need to keep your stuff dry (and it sounds like you do), then go with the POE dry sack or something equivalent. Don't bother with the Sea to Summit Ultra Sil dry sacks – plenty of people here have reported them to leak. The drain holes at the bottom of the pack are really more for convenience – you can get out of the water and just keep hiking. People have found the drain holes to be fairly straightforward to implement – it's a nice and clean look if you use grommets. I don't think that it reduces the functionality of your pack to add them; water will find a way in regardless. I checked out a link for where you are going – it looks like you're going to have a blast! Some of the rappelling looks pretty intense. Enjoy!

I don't think you're going to have issues with your GoLite pack retaining water, other than what the fabric absorbs. Any water that gets in the pack through the rolltop or (more likely) the pack seams will drain out the same seams. I wouldn't be concerned about that, provided your gear is stowed in a waterproof fashion inside the pack.

I read one of the articles written by someone on this site and he said he always pulls the bag inside out and then fills it with water to "test real world conditions" (something to that effect). Why is that testing real world conditions? Wouldn't putting gear in the sack, rolling and buckling it, and submerging it in water be a better and more realistic test? Am I missing something?

I just got an OR Helium drysack from REI and am filling up the bathtub now. They didn't have any of the Hydroseal ones and they don't have any POE Pneumo.