What’s your problem with bivys?

[Mike J]

I personally love Bivys for their ease of use and quick deployment / clean up. Great for moving fast! I think most people do not like them due to if its pouring rain its impossible to get in them dry…. A light tarp or coat used right can help with this though, takes practice.

[Patrick McFarlane]

I do most of my backpacking in the winter (love the solitude, hate bugs) and I use a WPB (eVent) Borah Gear bivy.   Up until last year, I used it with a tarp for overhead protection so I don’t need to zip the bivy up if it’s snowing.

I never had any issues with condensation because I wear a full vapor barrier suit.   The added benefit of the VB suit is that it seems to take some of the shock out of the cold exit if I need to get up to pee and when I wake in the morning.  It also protects my down clothes that I wear around camp.

I too am really drawn to the aesthetic of just tossing my shelter on the ground and getting in.  I find setting up shelters in the winter to be a major inconvenience.  In my area, the snow is usually too dry to hold snow anchors well (I need to hold my gloved hands over the anchor for a minute or so to melt the snow sufficiently for it to stick) and the gravelly ground is frozen solid so that you need Ti nail stakes and a hammer if you want to avoid snow anchors.

Because of this inconvenience, I’m planning on ditching the tarp altogether and relying exclusively on my WPB bivy this winter but I’m taking even more extreme measures to limit condensation:

https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/6286/page/2/#post-3768209

 

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