The Mummy

Another essential piece of camping gear, unless you camp indoors, is the good old sleeping bag. How many of us remember getting all excited about breaking out the sleeping bag in the den or living room, pretending we were actually camping or on an expedition, all because we couldn't actually go when we were so much younger, for one reason or another. My nephew did this a few years ago for what seemed like a month straight, complete with his little toy Spiderman indoor dome tent. As we get older, seems like we just don't get that excited about the bag anymore, as it is more of a necessity or even thought of as a shelter item.
I make almost all of my camping trips in colder weather. I don't like the heat, and camping in the heat for me is just miserable. In southern Mississippi, the heat and humidity makes it just unbearable for me if the nightly temps are anywhere near 70°F. Low to mid 60s, I might be able to sleep a bit, depending on the humidity, but will likely be on top of my bag, rather than in it, or will maybe sleep in a bivvy liner bag. But, since I do prefer the colder temps for my camping, I need a bag that will keep me warm. We don't usually get very extreme cold here, and when we do get what we consider to be drastic lows, I usually don't go camping, mostly due to trying to stay warm when out of the bag during the day. I figured a bag rated for around 30°F would be pretty good for me with warm clothing to boost the warmth if needed.

No Limits 32° mummy bag.

When I got back into camping a few years ago, I started looking around at local stores, and decided pretty quickly that I wanted a mummy style bag this time around. I also made the decision to go with one that would pack up small enough to store in the sleeping bag compartment of my camping pack. I got some good ideas from what I could actually see in a store, and started doing more research online. I finally settled on a No Limits 32°F bag from my local Academy store. It was a little more expensive than I'd like, but was a good bit less than big name brands, and reviews on it had been good. It had the right dimensions and weight for my requirements too, so it was a pretty easy choice.

The only issues I have had with the bag so far are very minor, so I'll get them out of the way first. The insulation is fairly thin, which I assume is due to the manufacturer trying to make the bag pack up as small as possible. As a result, don't expect much padding below you from the bag, you might want to look into a mattress pad if you need more cushion. Second, the little "no slip" dots on the back that are designed to keep it from sliding around as you toss and turn at night tend to come off easy and get all over the inside of the tent. Lastly, the compression sack that came with my bag, which is designed to store and then further squish the bag into a smaller size, is stretching and coming apart at some of the seams, quite badly in a place or two if I'm honest. I think I will have to actually replace the sack this season, at this rate. If I remember right, it came from the store a little stressed, as the bag is stored inside the compression sack when you buy it. Not a huge big deal, it is a cheaper bag after all, and I can actually just stuff the bag all willy-nilly into the storage compartment of my backpack without even trying to roll the bag up. This takes up a good bit more room and actually screws up the packing back up of everything else in the pack, but it can be done in a worst case situation. That's all the downsides to date, so not too bad.

Now the positives. Price, obviously. It is pretty comfortable to sleep in, despite being a mummy bag, which is pretty restrictive if you like to roll around or toss and turn at night. Having said that, it's not too bad to roll around in, overall. There is great foot room in the bag, which is a welcome comfort. The zipper works pretty well and doesn't tend to get stuck too easily on loose material, although I have had this happen once or twice. The drawstring on the hood works fairly well. There is a little pocket in the hood for a pillow to slide into, which is pretty handy. I can happily verify that it works with several different types of camp pillows, including my nice compressible pillow. It seems like, for me, the temperature rating is fairly accurate. I didn't assume it would be spot on, as I'm a bit skinny and can get cold at night fairly easy. I can recall being pretty toasty with temps in the 30s and 40s, but one night when it actually got down to 28° I distinctly remember being cold. I also had to put on a hood/face-mask combo thing that I have to keep my face warm, but that's to be expected. The great thing about these mummy type bags is that you can purchase a separate mummy shaped liner, or what is sometimes called a bivvy bag or liner, made out a variety of different materials, that will add another layer of warmth to your sleeping bag. Some can add as much as 25°F of warmth to your bag! I plan to find a good sale on one that will give me around 15° extra heat in mine, as I don't plan to camp when even just nightly temps get much below freezing. I'm thinking something along the lines of a Sea to Summit Thermolite Reactor liner bag. If I pull the trigger on that, expect a write up on it.

Bottom line, I'm very happy with the bag and think it was a good investment, which is key for me with my camping gear. I hate wasteful spending or trial and error purchases on gear. While I imagine that bigger name brand bags might be better in some ways, this bag has done the job just fine so far, for around half the price.

-Owen