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Kokatat Men's medium GORE TEX DRY SUIT. Excellent condition and maintained.Great for cold weather water sports for keeping warm and dry.Neck gasket needs to be replaced. This a fantastic suit for keeping you dry...

Unfortunately, we have had to change the date for this workshop. It has moved to Thursday evening, April 5th. Still plenty of space and availability to get your gaskets repaired!! Hope you can join us! Dry Suit Maintenance and Gasket Repair NEW DATE AND TIME: Thursday April 5 6pm Sunday March 18 – 9am to ~12pm Do you wash your dry suit in a top loader or front loader? What detergent should you use? Is it okay to use white vinegar? Can you bring back your dry suit’s DWR? What is DWR? Are your dry suit gaskets becoming worn, cracked, or do they have that ‘sticky’ feeling and the rubber sticks to itself? Where do you get gaskets? How do you replace them? NSPN together with Newbury Kayak and Canoe and Suzanne Hutchinson, Kokatat Rep will hold a dry suit maintenance and repair workshop to answer all of these questions and more! During the workshop, Suz will explain how to take care of this important and expensive piece of equipment. She’ll answer your questions about maintenance and repairs for the Kokatat dry suits most of us wear. But wait, there’s more! During the class, Suz will demonstrate how to replace a wrist and neck gasket and then we’ll break up into groups and 3 lucky NSPN members will get to repair their neck or wrist gaskets during the workshop – just for the cost of buying the gaskets from Newbury (more on this below). But what if you aren’t interested in buying the repair forms and getting your fingers sticky with Aquaseal? That’s where Newbury Kayak and Canoe comes in! They can quickly repair those gaskets for you! Just drop off your suit, they’ll replace the gaskets and you can pick it up when done! They will repair both Kokatat and Stohlquist. For those that love the do-it-yourself process, they stock Kokatat as well as Stohlquist gaskets. So, come join us to learn about dry suit repair, maybe get a gasket fixed, shop at Newbury, or just socialize with fellow kayakers. Space is limited. To attend the event – email info@nspn.org and let us know you’d like to attend the Dry Suit Maintenance workshop. The 4 (one by Suz, 3 hands on) onsite gasket repairs will be chosen by lottery. You must be an NSPN member to participate. If you’re interested in participating, let us know that when you RSVP. When you RSVP, we need the following information: Neck or Wrist (one or both) and size of gaskets to be replaced (if you’re not sure, we’ll help you figure it out). On March 24th, we will randomly choose 4 people to have either a neck or one/two wrists repaired in the workshop. We will notify the ‘winners’ by email that day and post here on the message forum. You will need to bring your dry suit and pay for the gasket(s) when you arrive. Gasket repairs must stay on the forms and cure overnight, so you will leave your suit there and be able to pick it up during their business hours the following week. Any questions, please email info@nspn.org. We look forward to seeing you there!

After arrival, we spent time on the beach talking about dry suits, cold water, signs and symptoms of hypothermia, etc. Rob had some excellent examples of items one can use to warm someone who has spent enough time in the cold to be very chilled, but not so bad off as to need medical attention. The ideas about layering for both ourselves as we dressed in our dry suits and for warming someone else were very good. Getting us all into the dry suits was an adventure. But once we were in with zippers done, we learned to burp. Then it was into the water, and more burping. This was my first time in a dry suit so the experience of going into the water and not getting wet was odd. Very odd!! After a few minutes, we were feeling the cold. We spent some time warming up and discussing various safety issues on the beach. Then it was into our spray skirts and PFDs and back into the water for some swimming. We didn't get far, but we all found some methods of moving ourselves through the water. And then it was back the beach. The brave amongst us (which did not include this author) took boats out and did some wet exits and rescues. I'll try it next time. Promise. Boats on cars, sometime in the sun, and we called it a day. An excellent day! Huge THANK YOU to Rob for a wonderful day!! I also send special thanks to Cathy for the use of her dry suit.