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Hints and tips for camping/hiking in cold weather

If you are camping or hiking in cold weather, it is important to keep warm. Hypothermia is a potentially fatal condition, but it can easily be avoided by taking some simple precautions to ensure you don't get cold in the first place. Below are some suggestions for staying warm in cold weather.
Your biggest enemy in cold weather is being wet or damp
This point cannot be emphasised enough. You will stay much warmer if only you can stay dry. This is not always as easy as it sounds, as there are several sources of water - rain, snow or just fog in the air, water coming up from the ground, and water coming from your own body as sweat.
Even a slight breeze will make it feel much colder
If your dinner is too hot, you blow on it to cool it down. The same thing happens to you if it is windy - it will feel a lot colder. This is because in still conditions, your body heat will warm the air around you, and that will insulate you against the colder surrounding air. In windy conditions, the air that you heating up is continuously blown away. The effect of wind chill is even greater if you are wet or damp.
Most heat loss is through your head
Most of your internal organs are tucked away deep inside your body, so although they need a good blood supply, the blood vessels are also buried deep inside your body and hence are well insulated. However, your brain also needs a very good blood supply, but unfortunately is situated in your head, so the blood vessels have to flow near your skin, where they lose a lot of heat.
There is a very simple way around this: Wear a hat.

 

Bearing these three points in mind, there are several steps you can take to stay warm:
Wear synthetic fibres
Synthetic fibres, such as nylon or polyester, are much better at moving water away from your body and not soaking it up. Cotton and wool will soak up water and then cling to your body, making you feel much colder. You can buy special synthetic base layer and underwear, but these are extremely expensive and only really necessary for extremely cold conditions.
Never wear jeans or denim
This is really the same point as above. Denim is not very warm even when dry, but when it gets wet it is attrocious. It is uncomfortable and will take forever to dry out.
Wear breathable waterproofs
If your waterproofs are completely waterproof in both directions, all your sweat will be trapped inside, and you will end up feeling damp and cold. Breathable waterproofs allow tiny droplets of water to escape, hopefully keeping you dry on the inside. As with all hiking gear, the more you pay, the better quality you will get and the more comfortable you will be. However, even the cheapest breathable waterproofs are adequate.
Note that breathable waterproofs will work much better if you are wearing synthetic fibres, as otherwise your clothes will soak up the sweat anyway.
Wear a hat
It may sound obvious, but it really makes a difference. If most heat loss if through your head, then wear a hat. This applies even when you go to bed - if you are cold at night, put a hat on in bed.
Shelter from the wind
Hike in the lee of the hill, or in the valleys, rather than on the hilltops. If it is cold, don't stop for lunch right on the top of the hill where there is least shelter. Wait until you are further down the hill, out of the wind.
Don't sleep in the clothes you have been wearing
Even if you have not had an active day, the clothes you have been wearing will be damp from your sweat. Take them off before you go to bed. If, for example, you want to wear socks in bed, then put on tomorrow's clean socks rather than leaving on today's.
If you're cold, put more clothes on
Again, it may sound obvious, but it is worth saying. If you wake up in the middle of the night feeling cold, then don't just lie there, do something about it - get a blanket or put a jumper on.
Warm up your clothes in your sleeping bag.
Put tomorrows clean clothes in your sleeping bag when you go to bed - then they will be warm when you want to put them on in the morning.
Use a "mummy" type sleeping bag
Get a sleeping bag that has a hood that goes over your head - remember, that is wear you lose most heat from.

 

There are more useful camping tips in the Scout Notebook