Ever since buying my Arc\u2019Teryx Naos about 10 years ago, I\u2019ve pursued a policy of buying only waterproof and watertight bags for my backcountry trips. It is truly liberating to be freed of pack liners, rain covers, dry bags, garbage bags, zip-lock bags, and all the other paraphernalia used to keep gear dry. Unfortunately Arc\u2019teryx has long discontinued the Naos series, and with my ever shrinking base weight, I\u2019ve had to consider other brands and fabrics for weekend trips. <\/p>\n
The best alternative by far is the OutDry series from Mountain Hardwear. As a quick primer, OutDry is a waterproof membrane that is bonded directly to an outer shell fabric. Unlike polyurethane, water can\u2019t seep into the potential space between the two layers, and the membrane won\u2019t break down or delaminate with repeated creasing. Combined with a roll-top lid, their packs are completely waterproof and watertight. There is now an entire series from 18 to 105 liters in alpine and hiking configurations, but I\u2019ve personally been using the Scrambler RT40 for weekend hikes with great success. As an example, last May I hiked the Grand Canyon rim-to-rim and accumulated quite a bit of dust and sweat by the end of each day. Just before reaching camp I would jump into the creek, pack and all, and ended up with clean skin, clean pack, and a dry sleeping bag. After two years and countless hikes in rain and sleet, I have yet to find a drop of water in the pack. <\/p>\n
The only real fault with the RT40 is the ridiculously small hip belt pockets, but that\u2019s nitpicking at what is otherwise an outstanding pack. If you\u2019re an avid backpacker, do yourself a huge favor and step up to an OutDry pack. Your pack will weigh less, you will hike farther, and you will never, ever, have to worry about a wet sleeping bag again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Waterproof construction keeps your gear dry<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":76,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[86],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29213"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/76"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29213"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29215,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29213\/revisions\/29215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kk.org\/cooltools\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}