Why Use a Dry Suit?

Dry suits revolutionized kayaking and other water sports by allowing you to stay warm and dry even while in the water! Unlike wet suits, drysuits are loose fitting, comfortable to move around in and easy to get in and out of. With a drysuit, you control your warmth with the clothing layer(s) you wear under it -- the dry suit keeps your clothing dry, but it doesn't provide much insulation in or of itself.

Gore-Tex® drysuits and other waterproof/breathable dry suits (for example: Kokatat's Tropos, Hydrus drysuits) have made dry suits comfortable to wear all day. Unlike the plain old waterproof drysuits, with GoreTex® Tropos or Hydrus  dry suits your sweat will "breathe" out through the fabric, yet the fabric is waterproof enough for surface swimming without water leaking in (it's magic!). With non-breathable dry suits you get soaked from your own perspiration. Same goes for most other non Gore-tex® drysuits even if they are advertised as "breathable". It's hard to quantify how "breathable" a fabric is, but in our field tests Kokatat's Goretex dry suits are still the driest of all (and yes we've tested Event® drysuits too). Kokatat was the first manufacturer to make waterproof/breathable dry suits that worked, and Kokatat is still the leader in waterproof-breathable dry suit manufacturing. To learn more about why Kokatat is the best brand of dry suits, click here Why buy a Kokatat dry suit. Suffice it to say, if we found other drysuits that worked as well, we'd be selling them too. The Kayak Academy proudly specializes in custom sized as well as standard fit dry suits by Kokatat. In fact we sell more custom fitted Kokatat drysuits than any other shop.

The two most popular options on drysuits are dry socks and pee systems. Dry socks make a dry suit much easier to step in and out of because the drysocks take the place of the tight fitting ankle gaskets -- so you can just step right in without having to bend over and stretch the ankle gaskets over your heel. Most men's dry suits are equipped with a waterproof "Relief" (pee) Zipper so you don't have to take all your gear off when natures calls. Women's drysuits can have either a waterproof drop-seat zipper or a front relief pee system (with the front Relief Zipper installed lowered than on men's suits so it can be used with a women's FUD Freshette® funnel).

Note we don't sell SCUBA diving dry suits. Diving dry suits cannot be made of waterproof/breathable fabric due to the high water pressure at depth. Also dive suits have large, clunky, expensive valves to let air in and out as you dive, and dive suits aren't cut for comfort when sitting in a kayak or paddling a canoe or raft, or sailing, walking in rain, and camping etc.)

To learn more about the difference between Hydrus 3L and Gore Tex® dry suits, click here Hydrus 3L vs. Gore-Tex®.

If you're not sure about which model or size drysuit is right for you, just call us. If you already know what you want, use our on-line store to click and buy any of the suits listed in our store (we will double check your size selection before shipping the drysuit to you).

Call us perfectionists if you want, but we feel if you are going to spend $500 to $1300.00 on a piece of gear, it ought to fit and function as well as possible. So we put a lot of our time and expertise into every suit we sell. We use our own proprietary data to check the fit before selling you a dry suit. We double check the gaskets for nicks and other defects, we lubricate and seal the zipper(s), and that's just the beginning. So a dry suit from the Kayak Academy will fit better, keep you drier, last longer, and feel more comfortable than if you bought the same suit somewhere else.

We are small and personal, but we stock the largest selection of men's and women's Kokatat Gore Tex and Tropos dry suit sizes and models including our own Silver Label Kokatat suits you won't find anywhere else. Other retailers generally consider XXL, King Size, and sometimes even women's sizes to be special order items, but we do our best to keep all men's and women's sizes in stock (including Women's XLS size). For women, we stock dry suits with and without Drop-Seat Zippers and front Relief Zippers (lowered for women) so you won't have to special order a suit just to get your choice of these important features. Most of the men's suits we stock have the waterproof fly ("Relief Zipper") since few guys want to live without that. After years of ordering custom sized suits (made to fit someone for whom the standard size suits didn't work) we now stock dry suits in what we've found to be the most commonly needed big and tall sizes and most commonly wanted features (i.e. arms or legs shortened for only $49 extra or torso lengthened for $113 extra). So if you need a big or tall sized suit or special options, there is a good chance we have what you need already made up. If you need a dry suit with custom sizing or features that we don't have in stock, we are happy to order it for you -- with no "Special Order Fee". 

We are on a first name basis with the folks at Kokatat and in near daily contact with them; we've toured their factory, given them input, done field testing for them, and we keep up on all the latest developments. We do more custom option and custom sized orders than any other Kokatat dealer. We do this custom sizing because we want you to enjoy using your dry suit as much as we enjoy wearing ours. When it comes to how much you'll use and enjoy your dry suit, getting the right style suit sized to fit you properly with the right size gaskets and/or dry socks makes all the difference. Everyone here owns and wears dry suits, and we have the experience to get it right for you.