Full dress out for winter trips

That blue duvet top looks a little tight to me, obviously another bloke who can’t find clothes large enough to fit properly.
No insulation in those Helsport foot sacks but an extra layer on its own adds a good amount of dead air.
Mike needs to see those I think
https://en.aventurenordique.com/helsport-footsacks.html

Thanks Karen. I love Erik Normark’s videos in every season. His winter layering video should be mandatory for anyone going winter camping for the first time. I subscribe to his videos and will likely make a contribution to help sustain the site.

And the little paperback “Allen & Mike’s Really Cool Backcountry Ski Book” is the “Bible” for winter camping. About 2/3 of the book is on winter camping with great illustrations.

looks like he has the same ski boots I have- Alpina Alaska’s, that’s encouraging  :)

did he say he’s using Gor-Tex (or other waterproofing) pants and jacket?  I’ve had a couple of bad experiences with Gore-Tex in really cold weather- they don’t breath enough and the water vapor from perspiration starts freezing on the inside of the jacket, not good.

cold rain/wet snow- yes; very cold- no

Mike,

I’ve found my eVent parka better in very cold weather than GTX but it also lets some wind come through in high wind situations.

Mike,

He’s wearing WPB shell pants with a membrane…not sure if it’s gore tex, but I’m pretty sure those are nylon shelled membrane pants.  The jacket, however is Etaproof, which I’m pretty sure is Ventile cotton.

Ahh- ventile would make sense fort very cold weather; I’ll take his word for it that membrane pants work for him :)

If you are not worried about rain then good-old 60/40 polyester/cotton (or similar) works great, very windproof and very breathable.  I’ve read about folks in Maine in extreme cold using fine Egyptian cotton outer layers, super breathable and also very windproof.

I used 60/40 for years before GTX was invented, and still would not GTX unless rain was possible.  I typically find it very humid inside GTX, but better than the coated fabrics that preceeded it.

In fact GTX is not very breathable, many of the charts comparing WPB fabrics have suppressed zero on the vertical axis, so what you see are very slight differences in breathability magnifed to look enormous.  They are afraid to include 60/40 as it would not look good for the WPB fabrics.  At least this is true on the charts I’ve seen, but I have not looked in a while.

Goretex an be very breathable. But not the stuff with the secondary coating to stop the contamination from body oils etc.
It’s one of the reasons I still use a +30 YO bivvybag, the earlier versions worked better, still waterproof enough for a bivvy but far fewer problems with condensation.
Still Goretex can be a reasonable technical solution for cold & wet conditions hovering around freezing point.

I have no problem with Gore-Tex when it’s 15-20-ish F plus degrees, but when it starts getting really cold (and I’m moving/perspiring) it’s definitely not the shell I want.