Which of this 3 sleepings for the Inca Trail July

Hi
I am looking for a sleeping bag to take with me on the Inca Trail (4 days). I am 5'6". There are three options that meet my budget:
The Kelty Sonora Regular 20F $85 3lb 4oz
The Kelty Light Year Regular 25F $80 2lb 6oz
The North Face Aleutian Regular 20F $79 3lb 6oz

I would appreciate any help. Thanks

Mariano

I would go with the Kelty Sonora only because that was the only bag that I read a writeup about. The bag was true to its temperature rating (depends whether you're a cold or warm sleeper). All three are good bags, did you check out the reviews?.

Is there any reason your list is so short? I'd not cheap out on this purchase, down sleeping bags last forever. Get something less warm than you need and wear extra clothing, as needed, when you sleep. This will make bag more utilitarian and adaptable in the long run.

I used my duck-down & feathers & cotton shell $35 mummy bag from nineteen-seventy-one for past couple of weekends. They don't actually last FOREVER...

Mariano -
In making the decision among the 3 bags listed, I would consider the following: usage on the Inca Trail (which is likely to be damp, although you will be in a tent, I assume), usage later (I assume this is not intended to be a one-trip use disposable bag), weight, and cost. Given that you are going to be on the Inca Trail, I would choose synthetic over down, because synthetic absorbs less moisture in the first place and if it does get soaked, you can squeeze most of the water out and it dries fairly quickly. Down is hard to dry, and on the Inca Trail, you won't have access to a laundromat to properly dry a down bag. A damp synthetic (like the Polargard 3D that both the synthetic bags use) will still offer a bit of insulation, where a down bag will not. Now, if you feel that you can keep a down bag dry in rainy conditions, then down has a number of advantages.

In terms of weight, all 3 bags are relatively light. The down bag does have a 1 pound advantage here, though. By the way, based on personal experience with Kelty and TNF bags, I would be skeptical of the 0-32F temperature ratings. From the other specs (size, amount of fill), I suspect they are more like 10 or 15 to 40 or 50 degree F bags. That, of course, depends on whether you are a warm or cold sleeper.

But here, I have to add that I disagree with calamity's suggestion of using clothing to boost the warmth of the bag. On the Inca Trail, you are likely to have a couple days where you get rain, hence get your clothes wet. Wet clothes do not boost the warmth of a wet bag, and if the bag were dry when you got in with wet clothes, the bag itself would become wet. Even so, here is another situation where the synth bags have an advantage in situations like the Inca Trail.

Cost - note that the down bag is significantly more expensive. In the context of an Inca Trail trek, this is negligible, but it still may be a consideration. This is where consideration of usage after your Inca Trail trip comes in - Down bags, properly cared for, have a significantly greater lifetime than synthetic (having 6 bags for myself currently, and a dozen or so over my 50 years as a teenager and adult - no, wait, I'm still a teenager, at least mentally!). Ok, more seriously, in the long run, a down bag can be much less expensive than down. My oldest down bag, which I still use occasionally, was bought in 1960. It isn't quite up to the -40F rating as a new bag (or is that "down to -40?), but I have used it in the past couple years in subzero conditions and been warm. But that was in dry conditions. If you expect to use the bag a lot over the next few years, you might want to consider the longevity factor.

There are a number of other bags I would choose over either Kelty or North Face. First, personally, I would take a synthetic bag on the Inca Trail. Secondly, I would look for a Primaloft bag - it is warmer for the weight and more compressible than Polargard 3D or Delta (and both Primaloft and Polargard are significantly warmer, more durable, and more compressible than other synthetic fills on the market at present). Primaloft is very close to a 600-fill down. You should look at Integral Designs' synthetic sleeping bags. I would also look at Marmot's and Mountain Hardwear's synthetic bags. MH uses Polargard Delta in many of their bags in this temperature range, which is quite good, but they are using something called Thermic Micro in their Ultralamina series, which is supposed to be close to Primaloft (haven't tried it, so I don't know).

Again, consider those factors I listed at the start.

-- thw Old GreyBearded One

Synthetics are sweet when things get really crappy. I've nearly frozen to death in spring weather in a winter down bag, and for years after, would only use synthetics.

But they have short life-span compared with down, and there is also additional trade-off in weight.bulk. For a number of years now, I'm back to using same winter down bag I nearly froze in..

I have a late 80s North Face synthetic that was rated to -20F and liked it pretty good. When new I slept in -10 or less in a tent, and thought it was just warm enough. With some acclimatization, it might have been okay at rated temp.

.Greybeard man: is your 1960 bag GI or what? That's an interesting point regarding wet clothes. Still if I were seriously cold, I'd probably put them on unless they were drenched.

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I haven't really evaluated my old NF synthetic lately but hope is may still be good for zero weather with bivvy cover, which isn't that bad.

My 1960 down bag is an Eddie Bauer Karakoram with overfill, at that time the top expedition bag. This was well before North Face, Mountain Hardwear, Feathered Friends, and the other current top companies were in existence. Kelty was still run by Dick Kelty, making packs and tents (no sleeping bags), and REI was still genuinely a climbers cooperative with only a store and mail order warehouse in Seattle. About the only other US-made (and available readily in the US) expedition bags at that time were The Ski Hut (from whence came the NF, SD, and several other company founders), Gerry, Holubar, and a New England company whose name I forget, but made bags for LLBean. Oh, and Abercrombie and Fitch, which at that time was exclusively an expedition and safari outfitter. Stephensons was just starting up at that time, with their first product being expedition sleeping bags. Since then, of course, as discussed extensively here, the Ski Hut, Gerry, and Holubar names have vanished, Eddie Bauer has shifted to Yuppie fashion clothing, and A&F has become something unrecognizable except for the name (even the logo is totally different).

I remember the Karakorum line from E. Bauer in late sixties...also Vulcan alarm wrist watches or some similar brand.