Re: [Paddlewise] cold hands

Okay, all you young'ns who still have blood supplies that go to great 
extremes.  It's probably old frostbite problems, but I've got SomeFrenchGuy's 
Syndrome, and even inside a house with a low thermostat setting, blood 
doesn't get to several finger tips.
The last time I did any winter paddling --- a year ago January while 
attempting, ironically, to demo the "Hand of God" rescue.  Rolling inverted 
for 15 or 20 seconds was hell, and whatever heat I owned was sucked out of my 
head.  Very, very cold hands.

Solution was to investigate, find and buy a set of diver's dry gloves at a 
local dive shop.  Interesting contraptions with nylon rings that are wrapped 
up in the dry suit wrist seal and the glove gauntlet and then lock together 
with friction.  With this stupid, almost-finished masters, never got to try 
them out, although, with only a thin REI liner inside these high-end 
dishwashing gloves, my left  hand stuck in a bucket of ice water (while I 
typed with the right) was fine for at least 20 minutes.  End test.

A much more economical option: bought the exact same gloves at Annapolis 
Performance Sailing (www.apsltd.com) for $13.95.  They're the weight of a 
heavy latex drysuit seal, so I wouldn't want to harvest barnacles with them, 
but, with a light liner, they feel like they wouldn't be intrusive at all.  
And, having said all that, I still haven't paddled them.  But they're on loan 
to a local paddling friend who should have some sort of report soon.  If 
anyone's interested, I'll post the results.

Typin' away --- project due

Jack Martin

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