What is a Dry Bag?
Ryan Hotchkiss August 30th, 2017 Posted In: Articles Tags: Kayak
If you love water sports, then you will agree that the dry bag may be mankind’s single greatest invention.
The biggest problem we water sport enthusiasts have is keeping our stuff dry while we’re recreating. Wet stuff is a nightmare. Whether it’s your clothes, your socks and shoes, your telephone, a towel to dry off with, your sandwich and cookies, or a book … if you need to keep it dry, the only way to do so on a river or lake or in the ocean is with a dry bag.
What Exactly Is a Dry Bag?
Dry bags are made of either nylon, PVC or rubber. Nylon dry bags have a laminate on the inside that prevents water from seeping between the cross threads of the nylon to the inside of the bag.
Shaped like a sandwich bag, dry bags are exceptionally simple with respect to design. Though there are some dry bags with zip-lock-type sealers, the most common type of dry bag is closed by putting the lips of the top of the bag together, rolling them down into a tight little cigar, and snapping the buckles on each end of the sides together.
It’s simple, brilliant and waterproof.
Why Not Just Use a Plastic Trash Bag or a Pelican Case?
What makes dry bags so unique is the fact that they are both flexible and extremely durable.
Sure, you can stuff all your things into a plastic bag and put the bag into a duffel bag, but when the bag tears — and they always do — everything inside gets soaked. Your cell phone is ruined, you e-book reader is ruined, you’ll be wearing wet clothes on the way home … the whole thing is a nightmare.
While waterproof boxes — like a Pelican Case — are extraordinary in their own right, they don’t take the place of a dry bag. Dry bags can be contorted and stuffed into tight areas, and they don’t bang around like a waterproof box.
If you are a SCUBA diver or surfer or a kayaker or rafter or windsurfer or a canyoneer or a fisherman who wades into the water — and you don’t have a dry bag — you aren’t treating yourself right.
