Sleeping Pads in Camping

Series Summary

Camping is an outdoor recreational activity in which the participants, known as campers, leave civilization behind and enjoy nature while spending one or more nights at a campsite. Camping may involve the use of a tent, a primitive structure, or no shelter at all. Camping as a recreational activity became popular in the early 20th century, and many campers frequent national parks, other publicly owned natural areas, and privately owned campgrounds. Camping may be its own activity, but it's commonly done in conjunction with other activities, such as hiking, swimming, and fishing.

Camping can involve using a lot of camping gear, particularly if the camper plans on long hikes or primitive camping. One of those most commonly known pieces of camping equipment is the sleeping bag. In this free video series, a camping expert will teach you about a number of different types of sleeping bags. You'll learn about sleeping pads to put under the bag, self-inflating pads, and pads or packs made specifically for women. Other variations include rectangular sleeping bags, mummy sleeping bags, and synthetic versus down sleeping bags. With these sleeping bag tips, you'll be able to rest comfortably and gain much needed strength for all of your camping adventures!

Video Transcript

"I'm going to talk about sleeping pads and a lot of people don't think they're that important but they kind of are. If you're out there getting some sleep at night, you can really mess your time on your vacation backpacking if you can't get enough sleep because you're not comfortable. Some people can go with a closed cell foam pad. The advantage of this is it's light but the down side, it's not quite as cushy. Depends on if you're a real heavy sleeper and it's easy for you to get to sleep this is definitely a nice way to go. Another down side, it's not very compact, so usually this gets strapped on the outside. These are open sole mats and with these, they self inflate. You just open them up, sit there and it will inflate while you go off and set someone else up in camp. Nice thing about pads, insulates you from the cold ground, very important thing to go along with your sleeping bad. If you have any questions give you local outfitter a holler."