traveling with wet suits

[Dave Kay]

I've bee diving 50 years. I came up before wet suits were common and never needed one down to 74 degrees F. I have avoided anything colder. This year I bought a Henderson fleece vest and dive booties for new fins. When I flew to my destination my bag weighed 49 lbs but even with 24 hours off diving before I flew, everything was still damp. The airline bitched about 3 lbs and I had to take stuff out of my suitcase to avoid the extra fee. My next trip is very far away and I need to stay under 50Lb on the way home.

Does any one have any ideas/tricks/tips to get this equipment to dry out in 24 hours or less? Thanks.

 

[mi000ke]

I lay mine out in the sun for a few hours - does the trick. Remember to dry the outside then reverse to dry the inside. Two other tricks: 1) get a hand held digital scale - costs just a few bucks - to see where you are weight wise. 2) check in at the curb and hand the person a $5 tip before the weigh-in. I've gotten by with a few pounds over several times doing this.

 

[TMHeimer]

Yeah, I forgot about outside & inside. Can't say I've seen airport curb check ins.

 

[guruboy]

Helps to have wind blowing on it

 

[bergersau]

Towel off the wetsuit thoroughly before laying out or hanging to dry.

 

[Centrals]

I suspect the scale on the check in counter was wrong. A vest + booties could never ever absorb 3lb of water!

As someone had already suggested, get a digital scale.

 

[Damselfish]

Roll up a wetsuit in a dry beach towel for a minute to soak up some water. Reverse and do it again. Hang if you can, or drape over chairs, in the sun and breeze as much as possible. Nursing the drying along helps, flipping and rearranging things as needed.

The legs of an upside-down chair are a good place for drying booties, especially for booties that flop over when wet instead of standing open. I keep a couple pieces of plastic craft canvas in my bag, rolled up it is also good for propping open floppy booties, or whatever.

 

[JamesBon92007]

Depends upon where you are--some places in the tropics it takes days for stuff to dry.

 

[KevinNM]

Air conditioning helps, it puts out fairly low humidity air.

 

[Damselfish]

Yeah definitely AC too. Especially once the sun is going down, or the gear is almost dry and pretty much matches the surrounding humidity!