First, thank to all for responses to my stove question.
How warm of a bag for a northbound thru hike starting in mid-late March? Looking closely at Marmot Hydrogen(1lb 5 oz, 900 fill down, pertex shell, around$300). It is rated at 30 degrees and I’m a reletively warm sleeper. Is that enough or do I go down to a 20 degree bag?
moosehiker
I used a 15 degree synthetic bag and it kept me warm most of the time until I switched out to my summer bag. You’ll probably carry the bag for a month at the beginning and the end. During the summer it’s to hot to even use an unzipped sleeping bag. I used a Kelty light top 55 degree bag for the summer, it’s available at campmor and cost about $50 and weighs about 2 lbs. A little heavy for some but it was cheap and makes for a good nights sleep even on the hottest nights.
A 30 degree bag may work for you if you sleep in all your clothes on cold nights. I like to carry a warmer bag and cut the weight from my clothing. I use the same clothing for the whole trip. I would go with the 20 degree bag or maybe a 10 degree bag. It can get pretty cold even in April in the Smokies.
Darth Pacman
That sounds like a pretty sweet bag. If you’re willing to pay the price, maybe you would not mind investing in a moonstone 800 fill liner as well that weighs 13-15 oz. and should extend the range of the bag to 15-20* REI had these for sale for $60-70 which is an excellent deal. You would have a ~2# ~15 degree bag for start and could send the liner home when not needed in summer.
Sweeper
I left march 1 and started with a 20 yr old synthetic bag rated at 20 deg. Plus a polartec bagliner with zipper. In Late May at Pearisburg VA before Memorial day I sent Bag home, but kept liner and long underwear. I also had LE Thermarest plus always slept in tent. Did not pick Bag up again until Manchester CTr. VT. In Retro would have kept bag at least another week maybe until JUne. That first week without bag was cold, on The Priest memorial day weekend it went down 36 deg that night.
Chef
A 30deg bag would be fine on MOST nights, but I’d definately take a bag liner just in case. You could always ship it home if you ended up not using it. You could make a fleece liner yourself for very little $$. Just get the Fleece at Walmart and sew it up to match your bag. Should add 10-20deg to the bags rating.
Sparky
Hey there,
Well I started January 2nd this year and have been carrying a 15* Down sleeping bag made by REI. I have yet to be cold and on at least one occasion went down to -9* ambient temperature. I do use my clothing in the bag to push the rating and so far this has worked very well. I will continue to use this bag until it warms up (if that ever happens 
) and then I will send home for a 45* bag. Take care and good luck!
Peace
-Rocket
www.trailjournals.com/ronrod
rrodiii@pocketmail.com
Rocket
20 degree should be fine. Synthetic will keep you warm when wet,dries out faster and dosent weigh as much when wet. My bag was $90.00 from Blue Ridge Mountain Sports.
Virginian