Campers Swear By This Low-Tech Hack To Stay Warm And Toasty In Your Sleeping Bag

It can be challenging to keep your body warm while camping in cold weather, and it's especially hard to keep your feet warm. They are the farthest from your heart, meaning the body has to work extra hard to get warm blood all the way to your toes. Sometimes it feels like no matter how hard you try, your feet somehow end up chilly in your sleeping bag on a winter-time camping trip. While you could rub them together like a praying mantis, that friction will only keep your toes warm for so long.

Luckily, there are plenty of easy tricks to keep your feet warm in the dead of winter. Particularly, there is one hack that campers swear by that you can start doing free of charge on your next camping trip. "If there's empty areas in your sleeping bag," says columbia1938 on TikTok, "you can fill those spots with extra clothes to reduce the space so you can warm it up faster." So, as you settle in for bed, instead of leaving your extra clothes in your bag or on the floor of your tent, stuff them under your feet, inside your sleeping bag, to make extra insulation and protect your feet from the cold ground. As Redditor HappySummerBreeze explained, it works "on the same principle of minimizing the size of the air pocket your body has to warm up." This way, you are using up all of the room in your bag to make sure no cold air can sneak its way into your socks.

Campers on Reddit also agreed with this easy tactic for staying warm. "Really the best way [to stay warm] would be to put clothes in the bottom of the sleeping bag," said u/BlackFish42c on the r/camping thread. And u/alicewonders12 mentioned an added benefit to this trick: "I put clothes in there so they are warm when I change into them in the morning."

Another way to keep those feet toasty is to use a vapor barrier liner (VBL) to trap in condensation from your feet. Vapor layers are dedicated clothing items made to trap in moisture and help regulate the temperature of your body. You can even DIY vapor liner socks with plastic bags. Simply put on a layer of thin socks, add some plastic bags to your feet, and then add another layer of socks to hold the bags in place. This will prevent your feet from losing heat throughout the night to ensure you stay cozy.

You can also DIY a makeshift heating pad with an uninsulated water bottle. Before you head to bed, heat up some water and dump it in a Nalgene or similarly non-insulated water bottle. Place the heated bottle into a sock or wrap with fabric. Then, you can place the hot water bottle between your thighs to activate blood flow in your legs. These simple, low-tech hacks are the perfect way to stay warm while camping in the cold.