UMBRO SHORTS : "Rule number one: don't inhale water."-- Daniel RussellCotton is not good for cold (or mixed) weather clothing becauseit insulates poorly when wet. Since hikers generally don't wearshorts in cold weather, cotton shorts aren't a problem.Hikers like cotton shorts because they are comfortable and arevery tough.If you look around, however, you should be able to find heavy dutynylon or poly/nylon blend shorts. These won't be as sturdy as cotton,but will dry more quickly (good if you go swimming in them). I havea pair of these from REI (I might have found them in the kayakingsection).You knw, that I've also wondered about the amount of cotton that is sold by 'outdoors' stores.....Here's what I use. They are sort of 'running' shorts. Theyhave an inner liner, and you don't have to wear undershortseither. The whole thing is nylon, so it dries fast. I alsocarry a very thin nylon wind-breaker over-pants which I wearwhen it gets a bit colder, or when bushwhacking. This combotakes me down to about 30 F degrees (0C).Oh yeah... I don't usually find the stuff in 'outdoors' stores.
UMBRO SHORTS : The pants come in all kinds of colors and can be coordinatedwith your tent, pack, etc., giving you the look of a truelycolor-consious outdoors person. Hell, my black pants evenmatch the bottoms of my cooking pots!I tried out many options of shorts over my 25 years of backpacking as anadult. I settled on running shorts with stretchy liners for the last tenyears, the kind with high splits up the sides. This was fine until Iadded a bit of weight and chaffing from my thighs rubbing together becamean issue. I started wearing lycra/nylon running tights/shorts that solvedthis problem. I purchase shorts with the greatest amount of lycra inthem, 22% I believe is the highester percentage I've found.I found though that unless I was careful I "tore" them on rocks/logswithin a week. I hiked for a month on the PCT with a huge hole in mytights, which didn't get worse after I started wearing running shortswithout the liners over them. That, I found to be the perfect combinationof comfort and utility. I think what also helped was carrying a footsquare piece of ensolite that I religiously put on the ground/rock/log Iwas going to sit on before doing so. After a while what seemed aninconvenience became a routine part of sitting.
UMBRO SHORTS : In the last ten years of hiking, in summer months mind you, I have notworn pants of any kind on the trail. Even in Oregon at the height of bugseason I refused to so restrict my movements. I still carry a pair ofwindpants, lightweight capilene, and polartec 200, skintight fleece pants,but have found I use only the fleece around camp and to sleep in. Thissummer I think I feel confident enough to "let go" and leave the capileneat home. IMHO rain pants in the summer on the west coast are a marketingpersons idea of what should be carried. If you're hiking in the rain youdon't need rain pants. If you stop for lunch, take out your groundclothand wrap it around your legs. Instant warmth.I've also done this in mostquitoland in the Sky Lakes Wilderness and ThreeSisters area of Oregon on the PCT when it was 80 degrees to keep the bugsoff. Once in the Indian Heaven wilderness in southern washington, a badblack fly/mosquito area in early July, I used my groundcloth as a blanketas I lay next to the trail, ate my lunch, and read a novel. I rememberthis because two wild-eyed, well-bitten and almost frantic hikers in their50s came down the trail slapping away and asked if they could crawl underthe groundcloth with me. They stopped for only 30 seconds because theywere truly crazed by the zooming and buzzing and biting going on.
UMBRO SHORTS : Having spent too many hours "hiking" (read slogging/post holing) throughsnow, I make sure I carry "lightweight" nylon gaitors to protect my skin,not to keep me from getting wet. They don't need to breathe, they justneed to stay up.Jeffrey OlsonSchool of Social WorkUniversity of WashingtonSeattle, Washington, where rain dampens the streets, but not the spirit...Yeh, I dont like cotton clothing but it really depends andwhere and when you go. As for shorts, I prefer baggy supplexnylon shorts. Columbia sells them for around $15. I preferthe longer style and I dont like the liners and cut them out.Cotton also appear in underwear and I have long followedColin Fletcher's advice on this one and leave it at home.As others have noted, with age, chafing is becoming a problemand I will get some synthetic liners shorts this season.Pants definitely should be determined locally. If youare in places where the conditions might be the sameall day long, like above tree line out west, you cango with a combo that is warm but is also a hassle tochange out of with out removing boots. And that is towear synthetic long johns under nylon shorts. In someplaces this combo is the standard uniform.
UMBRO SHORTS : I hike in NewEngland where you can be above treelineone minute and in the stuffy trees the next and thenbashing thru the stinging nettles the next. As Pete -the fashion plate- Hickey noted, nylon supplexpants work great. The ones with full length sidezips like those from LLBean go on and off fasterwith out changing your footwear. I use a slightlyinsulated version of these pants rather like theMarmot DriClime windpants. These are IMHO the absolutelybest things for general backpacking. If you need cheap OK pants and you can live withneeding to take boots on and off to adjust, cheapDickies brand work pants cost only $15 or soat K-mart and they dry relatively quickly. Moreso than all cotton. Wash and wear them alot and they *will* break in.... eventually.From: ()Subject: Re: Clothing below the belt Newsgroups: Date: 1996/04/15 On 15 Apr 1996, david mann wrote: I met some guys on the PCT who swore by knee-length polyester dresses, sans underwear. I still haven't tried it.
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