Outdoor Research Seattle Rain Hat

Great hat for hiking on those not so sunny days.

Wearing glasses while hiking presents numerous issues especially when rainy. The Outdoor Research (OR) Seattle Rain Hat provides near umbrella like performance to keep the rain off my glasses. 

I put the hat to the test in our latest trip to notoriously rainy British Columbia. Since everything had to fit in carry-on luggage, an umbrella was not an option, but the rain hat was!

The clouds in the background came to the forefront and brought a healthy deluge.

When the downpour began, the hat easily kept rain off my glasses and channeled toward my back. The rain continued on and off for 3 hours and the hat had no problems staying dry the entire time.

However, before the rain started, I did notice that hat was significantly warmer and was much worse at breathing than my normal sun hat. This warmth can be attributed to the lining inside of the hat comfy and for better or worse—warm.

The back of the brim is longer than the front and this worked well to channel water toward my back.

Folding up the sides using the velcro worked well and did seem to let the hat breath a little more and it was good when the wind was blowing hard. That is the hats true weakness. The brim being only semi-rigid is more apt to collapsing in the wind. The chinstrap is great at keep the hat attached, but the brim hit my head more than a few times with the wind. So rolling up the sides is really the only option. Luckily it works well and doesn't reduce the brim surface area that much. 

So, when using as intended—as a rain hat, it is very functional. If however, you are using as a sun hat on a warm day—find something else as it won't be pleasant.

Background

I rarely leave home without some sort of hat. I have an entire box dedicated to hats for different climates and weather.