Dry Suit – 1/6/2014

I got a dry suit (Wikipedia) for Christmas from my parents. I do enough cold water paddling that I should have better equipment to keep me safe. All of my flipping in my boat happen during cold water times. I was worried when I first got the suit that it was broke. I had a very difficult time getting the zipper to move the first time. Once it moved one time, it was fine after that!

This is me trying on the suit for the first time.

Here I am with it first on doing a mirror selfie. Unfortunately for me, the neck gasket enhances my double chin.

I filled up the tub with cold water only to simulate a real life scenario, then sat down. When I did, all the air inside the suit rushed from the legs where the water pushed on it up to the parts out of the water. That is why I looked puffed out. After this photo, I put the fingers in the neck and pulled it out. I got a rush of air as it came out of the suit.

 

 

With cold water, its often hard to tell if you’re getting wet, or if you’re just cold inside the suit. In my case, I was getting wet. At first I thought the suit was defective, but it wasn’t. It turns out that I didn’t open and close the second zipper. Each zipper must be opened and closed one time to make the seal correct. Once I did this, it didn’t leak on the follow up. Of course I didn’t know this at the time and don’t look too happy!