Yer tellin' us that wool is **better** than synthetic pile (e.g. polar fleece) for staying warm when wet? Interesting theory, but I don' t think I agree with you one bit and you won' t find many outdoorsmen who do! In fact, mho is that synthetics are better when wet than wool because they don' t retain as much water and are much, much quicker and easier to dry out. Wool can get wet and heavy, synthetics don' t. Wool takes forever to dry out and it' s tough to shake or wring water out of it. Pile is nearly as warm wet as when it' s dry and a quick shake and/or wringing get' s a huge percentage of the water out of it.

I' m not arguing with you that wool keeps you warm when wet. But you said it' s better than synthetics in this aspect.

And you' re saying wool is quieter than synthetic pile? How does that work? Again, just not true, imho. Both are soft, quiet fabrics.

Wool is great stuff and a very intelligent choice for those that choose it. In fact, I prefer wool pants over synthetics because the ones I have (old army field pants) are much tougher than synthetics, less prone to be damaged by hard use and camp fire sparks, and because of the particular weave of these pants, pick up less burrs, etc, and break the wind better. Now if you' re saying you like wool outer layers because of these factors, I' d agree 100%. But the statements you made aren' t correct, imho. - zeke, picker of nits.[>:]