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Bought a cheap sleeping pad and regretted it until I shelled out for the good one
I went with a $30 foam pad from a big box store for a 3 day trip in the Smokies last spring. By night two I was waking up every hour with my hips pressed into the ground. My buddy let me try his inflatable Therm-a-Rest on the last night and I got 7 solid hours of sleep. Soon as I got home I ordered a similar one for $120 and it's been a game changer on every trip since. The extra weight in my pack is totally worth not feeling like I slept on a parking lot. Now I tell anyone starting out to skip the cheap foam pad and just get a decent inflatable one from the start. Has anyone else tried a budget pad and then wished they just paid more up front?
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kai_park24d ago
Man, $30 for a foam pad is wild. I didn't even know you could get one that cheap. That's basically sleeping on a yoga mat with extra steps. Spending that much just to feel every rock and root in the ground sounds like a special kind of torture. Glad you finally saw the light though.
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joseph_adams6624d ago
Feeling every rock and root" is EXACTLY what happened to me too. I learned my lesson after one miserable night and went straight for a proper inflatable.
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Right? That first night on a foam pad I woke up thinking a mole had tunneled under my tent. My hips were so bruised I looked like I got tackled by a team of angry toddlers. Sleep is not optional when you're backpacking, it's survival. An inflatable might pop one day but at least I'll be well rested when it does.
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