Re: best ultra light raingear
scout
those are some excellent observations.
i do agree on the whole ultra light weight rain gear thing. i myself have several sets of it, they all ball up into the size of a water bottle from several manufactures, to me this is great if you are out and might get caught in a rain storm for a brief period of time, eventually it will soak through and you are going to be wet
not to mention i would not want to be shooting prone with this stuff. so for me its out
the absolute best rain stuff is going to be your pvc or grudens type gear i think impertech might fall into this category, i have no personal expereince with it myself, but i do have several sets of the real heavy duty stuff i use for overnight fishing and dive trips when you are guaranteed to get wet, all of my stuff like this is bibs, great for on a boat and staying dry but for me at least too heavy and not real comfortable for shooting and walking, however i might bring a set to asc and if the weather is jsut horrible put it on and use it.
i ended up buying these pants
http://cgi.ebay.com/Northface-Gore-Tex-M...=item20af83b9b0
they are very heavy duty, full zippers for easy on and off, they are probably more of a pant than a shell but they do fit over a pair of pants, or if i know the weather is going to be nasty i will just wear them as pants with a pair of long johns underneath, then keep an extra pair of pants in a waterproof bag in my pack.
i am going to try them out this weekend at Practical
i think these type pants with an impertech type parka would be ideal
to me i would want what ever pants to have a durable seat and knee area, we are going to be laying on rocks and shooting alot of prone shots, and i would either want bibs or a long parka coat
the last thing i would want is having a gap and then having water run down my pants all day
i guess there is probably no "ideal" set out there, they all have strong points and bad one
in the end it would probably be best to have several pieces to choose from depending on the rainfall and then temperature range
while we are on the subject, to me what you have under your outer layer is also very important. i personally would not wear anything cotton, i like wool or the new syntheic stuff, when you get wet or damp, it will breath and dry faster and also me more comfortable if you get wet