Cleaning and Storing your Sleeping Bag

Sleeping bags can get smelly. Just admit it! Imagine what your feet must smell like after an arduous hike through mud and swampy waters. Not pretty (or at least if you are me). And then these said feet are stripped bare and cocooned in a mummy sleeping bag for 8 straight hours. All I can say is at least feet are positioned as far away from the nose as possible! But seriously, all jokes aside, it's definitely a smart move to clean your sleeping bag of all odors before storing it away for the season. Here are some useful tips for cleaning and storing your sleeping bag:

1) To clean your sleeping bag, fill a bathtub with warm water and mild soap. Fully submerge the bag in water and wash by hand (especially the area where your feet lay). Rinse the bag well. There are 2 options for drying. Option 1 is to hang the bag outside. As the bag is drying, shake it out several times to avoid clumps in the filling. Option 2 is to allow the bag to drip dry and then place in the dryer on an extremely low setting with some tennis balls (read the label first to make sure this is okay). This sounds weird, but tennis balls help distribute the filling. This option might be better suited for those who play tennis and already have balls in the house. Up to you...

2) Make sure the sleeping bag is completely dry before storing. You want to maintain the sleeping bag's original shape and loft as much as possible, so storing it out of the compression sack is ideal (some places to do this are under you bed or hanging in a closet).

After completing the above steps, relax and think happy thoughts of just how nice and fresh your first sleep of the camping season will be next year.
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