Rain gear ?

[paul t]

I am looking into changing up my rain gear moving from pants to a skirt.  While I typically hike in colder temps, I run hot and always sweat through my clothes anyway when I’m out in the rain.

With this in mind, I’d like to get a rain skirt, but I’m looking for any advice and/or experience with these items.

I’ve been looking into a skirt and gaiter combination and am curious over the types of skirts (zpacks, EE, and ULA) and gaiters (ankle vs calf height).  Any help is appreciated, thanks!

[Link .]

. 3F UL GEAR RAIN SKIRT . I wear a rain skirt, I have an old Zpacks one that is different than the current one, an EE, ULA and the 3UL one I linked above. I prefer a calf length but I have also worn a longer( I am short), but calf length is my preference too long and it can get in the way, I also almost always hike in shorts.

[Jerry Adams]

A longer jacket gives some of the same functionality as a skirt

Quick google, I have no idea if this particular jacket is good:

https://www.llbean.com/llb/shop/121905?page=men-s-trail-model-rain-coat&bc=12-26-593-504714&feat=504714-GN2&csp=f

It’s funny how the style in the U.S. is to have short jackets.  Looking at REI, they have no long jackets.  They have a couple ponchos though, they’re long, give the same functionality as jacket + skirt.

Western wear have coats, e.g. (random image from internet)

[Ben C]

I wear an early edition Zpacks skirt and really like it.  I think DCF is a nice fabric for a skirt.  Moisture does not make it cling to your legs. It stays a little stiff when wet and allows lots of air flow. I think mine is shorter than the current version.

[paul t]

Any ideas or feedback on the differences, pros and cons, between the rain skirts?

I may have to see what longer lightweight and durable ponchos are out there.

[Diane “Piper” Soini]

I have a ULA rain skirt. It’s silnyon and stuffs into its own little pocket. Many of its qualities will apply to other rain skirts.

Here are the cons: It is hot to wear when hiking just like rain pants can be. It fastens together with a few velcro bits. The bottom-most velcro makes the skirt too narrow to hike in and as you climb over things or stretch your legs out, it pulls open, then closes up again when the velcro catches itself again. It’s kind of annoying. The waist band is elastic so it is easy to put on and will fit over anything you are wearing and will fit on you like a skirt, but it will not lay flat and act as an extra little flat tarp for your shoes like some others will do. I find that I don’t really need it to do anything like that. It is water proof fabric, but it is a skirt so it moves about as you walk and the water that accumulates on it flings about so that your lower legs will get wet.

Here are the pros: It stuffs into its own pocket and is small, it functions well, it is warm if you are in desperate need of some additional warmth, it is easy to put on because you don’t have to step into it or take off shoes or anything, you can sit down on wet things (unlike chaps), it is not as hot as full rain pants, it works well enough. It’s washable and reusable.

You can make your own rain skirt out of a drawstring garbage bag and that will give you a good idea of what it feels like to hike in a rain skirt at a fraction of the cost of buying something.

[Jeff McWilliams]

Diane, I was similarly annoyed by the ZPacks rain skirt and the way you really couldn’t stride in it.  It’s basically a rectangle of material you wrap around your waist and then cinch tight at the top.  What would that be called in women’s fashion, something like a pencil skirt?

So anyway, I sewed a silnylon rain “kilt” using a legit Scottish tartan pattern from RibstopByTheRoll.  I sewed 3 or 4 pleats in it on each side.  It’s a lot more usable, but I think it would feel even better with more pleats.

A “pencil skirt” design makes a poor rain skirt/kilt pattern.

 

[Tom K]

“Western wear have coats, e.g. (random image from internet)”

Those guys are straight out of “Gunfight at the OK Corral”.  Surely you post in jest?

[Pedestrian]

Surely you post in jest?

(Thread drift……..)

I find myself thinking that more often than not with that poster……

Oh well…..good to have a jester around I guess….

 

[Jerry Adams]

I don’t think those coats that cowboys wear (or do they, maybe just in the movies) are too heavy for backpacking

But, I think they’ve been proven by years of hard use riding around in the rain, getting stuck out in bad weather,…

I think we can learn a lesson – have a lightweight jacket longer.  It keeps the rain off the tops of my pants, sort of like a rain skirt.  With a rain skirt, the top of the skirt is tight against you so there isn’t ventilation and it gets sweaty.  With a long jacket, where the top of a skirt would be, it’s loose so there’s more ventilation.

I saw some documentary, maybe in the Himalayas.  The people from the U.S. wore short jackets.  The locals wore long coats.

Or look at eskimo clothing – long coats.

Or men’s dress coats are long.

As long as they stop short of the knees they don’t inhibit movement.  Maybe half way between waist and knees.

In my experience

[Jerry Adams]

“that poster”

Maybe I should be miserable all the time : )

[Mark Fowler]

In Australia and NZ the standard used to be a mid thigh to knee length coat, originally in oiled japara. Enough to just about cover a pair of shorts.  I have a white ZPacks jacket that Joe added an extra 6″ to and a longer zip to match.

[Jerry Adams]

Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about

Okay, there was a grain of humor to the cowboy coat example.  I wasn’t suggesting buying a cowboy coat.  I think it’s good to be open minded and extricate useful characteristics from distantly related things.  That was my point.

The shortness of U.S. outdoor jackets is a style thing.  A longer jacket would be better.

Okay, I’ll try to go back to being miserable : )

[Todd T]

The shortness of U.S. outdoor jackets is a style thing.  A longer jacket would be better.

I agree for walking around, but if you’re wearing a pack, you’re either gonna cinch that long thing down so it behaves like a short top (with no ventilation) plus a skirt, or you need the long thing to be big as a tent cover you and your pack.  What am I missing?

[Jerry Adams]

That’s a good point.  If it’s cold and wet I just leave the coat long.  The waist belt of the pack goes around the coat.

Otherwise I’ll pull the coat up above the waistbelt and unzip it.  The only negative is that it’s folded or wrinkled against my back.  With a short jacket you’d still have to pull it up above the waist belt but there isn’t as much fabric being folded/wrinkled.  That extra strip of fabric on the long jacket doesn’t make that much difference.  Even with the coat pulled up above the waist belt, it’s longer in front which provides better rain protection.

I spend a fair amount of time without pack – day hiking from base camp or fiddling around camp in which case the longer jacket works better if it’s raining.

I was looking at jackets at REI and they all stop short of the crotch.

I bought a Gore Tex jacket at REI maybe 20 years ago and it’s longer, goes below the crotch.  Maybe they used to make jackets longer?  Thus my theory that the current style is to make them short.  It does require less fabric so it saves some money and weight.

When I’ve made jacket longer than about 3/4 of the way from waist to knee, when I’m walking and moving my legs back and forth, the jacket rubs against the legs and is annoying.

With a pleated kilt, in the pictures I saw, it goes below the knee.  Maybe with the pleats it doesn’t rub against the legs when you’re walking?  That would provide better rain protection so would be a good thing.

[Sean P]

Some years ago Sierra Designs made a cagoule that fitted over the hipbelt (at the front) and extended to the mid thigh.  Never understoid why they didn’t catch on as they solved many of thd problems described in this thread.

[Bruce Tolley]

@ Sean. A traditionally desiged cagoule should be long enough to cover your ankles. I had a circa 1972 NorthFace waterproof cagoule that had two modes, you could unsnap it for full coverage or snap the hem up so it fit like a waterproof anorak. that worked fine for walking or hiking without a pack on, sitting out a storm, creating a temporary bivoac but was a steam bath to hike in with a backpack.I also carried a windproof but not waterproof 60% nylon? /40% cotton REI parka. I think cagoules were never very popular in the US. Army surplus rain ponchos were cheaper and served the same function. Despite the recommendation of cagoules by Colin Fletcher in earlier editions of The Complete Walker, I would posit that Cagoules and 60/40 parks were eventually were displaced by waterproof breathabable parkas with pit zips in the 1980s.

[Sean P]

Yes good points.  The SD ‘cagoule’ was more like an anorak, I think, although they called it a cagoule, and was made from a WP membrane.

It was supposed to function like a longer, better ventilated WP membrane ventilated jacket.

 

 

[Dale Wambaugh]

Poncho time! Keeps your pack dry too.

[Diane “Piper” Soini]

Well, considering I am a woman with a generous layer of lower body fat, I would say that for most of you guys, the cut of the MLD rain skirt would be adequate for hiking. It is not narrow like the Z-packs. I really think that if I could just stop the bottom velcro from connecting the skirt would be perfect. It’s not necessary to connect all the way down. Having essentially a back slit in the skirt makes it both more functional and more ventilated.

As for not wanting something tight around the waist, the skirt’s waist elastic is not tight. You could pull the front out over your backpack hip belt and get it away from your body. By being separate from the jacket, you can vent by unzipping your jacket.

I forgot one other con for the rain skirt. Silnylon is very slippery and so even though technically you CAN sit down in a rain skirt, good luck sitting down on anything that isn’t flat. You’ll just slip right off whatever you try to sit on.

[HkNewman]

I think we can learn a lesson – have a lightweight jacket longer

In American outdoor clothing lingo, that would be a rain parka.  Montane sold one in a 2.5 layer Pertex (Grand tour something or other), which hasn’t popped up on Google recently.

Jackets, in any case, sell better since they are more athletic iirc … but, we are a fashion over function type of society.   Still you’d think a jet black parka would sell – maybe get rid of the athletic stitching, put some slanting handwarmer pockets on, etc..

[Dale Wambaugh]

LL Bean has made a long rain coat for some time (https://www.llbean.com/llb/shop/506675). It could use a back slit and pit zips for actual trail use. It has to be relatively heavy. Long coats are great in cold windy weather.

[William Chilton]

Haglofs does a number of longer rain jackets, including the L.I.M Proof Parka (currently half price at Sportpursuit) and the heavier Grym Evo Jacket

[Lance Stalnaker]

Have you considered an umbrella?  I ditched the rain jackets/shirts/etc. a few years back and have been very pleased.  I am a very heavy sweater in warmer weather, so I get more wet with a jacket on.  I still have my Golite umbrella but will look to get the SMD silver shadow when the time comes, there is also a hands free kit to attach it to your pack.  Differing opinions on this, but I love using an umbrella over any other option.

[Dave Heiss]

You could also consider the Packa. It’s cut long and is very well ventilated.

http://www.thepacka.com/

 

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