Layering for Sleep: A First Look at Sea to Summit’s NEW Gear for a Good Night’s Rest
This article is brought to you by Sea to Summit — their innovative line of new sleeping bags and liners, promises a cozy, warm, and comfortable sleep in the outdoors.
Sleep. It’s essential. Not just in the day-to-day of normal life, but also on those nights far from home, removed from modern day conveniences, when you are sleeping outdoors.
In some regards, sleeping outdoors handily offers some of the best conditions for a restful night. A full day’s worth of movement helps your body de-stress and build up a reserve of melatonin. The darkness and immense quiet replace any outside barrier that makes it hard to slip into deep REM sleep.
But the benefits of the outdoors are voided if you don’t have the right gear. Sleeping outside requires advanced preparation to make sure you get a full night’s rest and wake up feeling energized.
Think of your outdoor sleep system – sleeping bag, liner, mat, pillow, and shelter – like layers you pack when going on a hike. You want to be prepared for any condition. Enter Sea to Summit’s new, improved sleeping bags and liners that help tailor your system for a quality night’s sleep that checks the box on comfort, warmth, ventilation, and packability.
The company designs gear for the world’s extreme places. New this year, the company redesigned its sleeping bag and liner series, featuring the Spark Sleeping Bag and Reactor liner as well as a variety of other liners and bags to ensure you have the right gear for your next adventure.
“Our goal was to evolve sleeping bags and liners to build on the versatility that has been a hallmark of Sea to Summit sleeping bags,” said Sea to Summit GM of Product Merchandising Kevin Joyce, in a statement. “A key element in this is the Free Flow Zip System, which has been revised for 2024 on models such as the Trek/Women’s Trek and introduced—for the first time—into the lightweight realm on the Spark and Spark Pro. The Free Flow Zip System allows the user to adapt their sleeping bag to meet their own preferences and a variety of external conditions.”
The Spark: A lightweight, comfortable, compact sleeping bag
The Spark series is the warmest for lightweight adventures, featuring sustainably sourced, high loft, 850+ FILL Power. Nothing surpasses down for its weight-to-warmth ratios, and the sleeping bag is body-mapped with vertical baffles in the chest and horizontal baffles in the bottom half of the sleeping bag, so the warmth shows up where your body needs it. A non-PFC ultra-dry down treatment helps the down stay fluffy and warm when conditions outside are damp.
The 2024 Spark only builds on a tried-and-true product, finessing the details to produce a sleeping bag that is truly designed for outdoor pursuits, the kind of adventures you’ll remember for the rest of your lifetime.
The Spark launches with a new technical hood designed for greater warmth retention. Lightweight 10D Nylon outer shell gives the hood and footbox improved water resistance, handy when condensation creeps inside your tent. Premium 10D Nylon inner adds breathability for even greater comfort.
It’s also versatile: Sea to Summit’s Free Flow Zip System has multiple zipper configurations to let you adjust for multi-seasonal functionality and effective climate control. The Spark zipper system of certain temperature ratings can also be paired with the corresponding Spark Women’s sleeping bag to zip couples together to share warmth while sleeping together.
The Spark packs down smaller than any other sleeping bag in the Sea to Summit offering. And it still has the mummy profile that’s landed high marks for the Spark in gear reviews.
Bottom line: The Spark prioritizes packability and light weight so you can get to camp, and once you zip up, you’ll stay cozy and warm all night long. Those are the boxes you need to check to get the sleep you need, wherever you may be tucking in for the night. The Spark models range from 0 degrees Fahrenheit up to 45 degrees Fahrenheit.
Additionally, Sea to Summit offers a women’s specific model in the Spark series, that’s narrower in the shoulder and wider from the hip-to-knee to properly shape the ‘figure four’ position women commonly sleep in for optimal warmth and heat retention.
The Reactor Liner: The layer that makes your sleep system versatile for the full range of conditions
The Spark sleeping bag is a worthy item on its own, but when you pair it with one of Sea to Summit’s Reactor Liners, it becomes even more versatile.
Think of the Reactor liner like a base layer for your sleeping bag. It’s the extra layer for whatever you need: warmth when it’s cold outside, moisture-wicking in damp weather, and a smooth feel for comfort.
The Reactor Liner is made with Thermolite Pro fabric, which is constructed with hollow fibers and infrared-absorbing ceramic pigments. This technology absorbs and retains body heat, circulating that warmth back to you. The Reactor Liner Extreme adds a 7 percent boost to the warming properties of a three-season sleeping bag like the Spark.
The Reactor Liner is also built with HeiQ, a material that neutralizes body odor, so the liner stays fresh multiple nights in a row. (And when you get home, you can wash the liner in a regular top-loading washing machine.)
The Reactor integrates, by design, with Sea to Summit’s sleeping bags. A snap on the shoulder lines it up with the Free Flow Zip System, and for those middle-of-the-night bathroom runs, a drawstring on the foot lets you hitch up the liner, so the midnight cold doesn’t sting so badly.
Come morning, the Reactor Liner packs down into a minimalist pouch thanks to its compression sack.
Frontier cookware for coffee the next morning
Dawn breaks, you unzip the tent, stretch tall, and set out to make coffee.
Sea to Summit has you covered here, too, with their new line of Frontier cookware and dinnerware — an innovative upgrade to the previous X-Series.
Boil water in the Frontier Kettle, which comes with a silicone lid grip for safe handling while you steady a stream of water over the Frontier Pour-Over. Let those coffee grounds bloom and steep. Then, scooch back into your sleeping bag, hand your partner a freshly brewed cup of coffee, take a sip, and let the caffeine do its thing.
A new day has begun.
This article was brought to you by Sea to Summit
