DON'T GET SOAKED

THE VERSATILE PONCHO IS AN INDISPENSABLE AND AFFORDABLE PIECE OF GEAR

- STEVEN PAUL BARLOW

Guns, knives, flashlights, devices for making fire, a cook pot and spork, paracord, and ways to treat and carry water - those things are always on my list when I gather gear to head out on an adventure.

But there's something else that I include on my list that I don't see on many other lists. That something else is a waterproof poncho. Perhaps that's because I have a dark cloud hanging over my head, or maybe it's just because I spend most of my time in the Northeast. I get rained on a lot. I've always joked that if the forecast calls for a 20 percent chance of rain, then it means that I'm the one in five who's going to get wet.

When you're caught in the rain, a good poncho can keep an outing from becoming a disaster.

A PONCHO'S MANY USES

I consider the poncho an indispensable piece of gear all year long because of all the ways I can use it. Here are some of them:

1 Raingear. Yes, obviously, using a poncho as a garment when it rains is the reason it was designed.

2 Windbreaker. Even when it's not raining, I've often put a poncho on during breaks from hiking or hunting when I didn't want to become chilled.

3 Dry Seat. When wandering the woods in times of rain or snow, I've frequently draped a poncho over a log so that I'd have a dry place to sit to prepare my lunch or to watch a likely spot when hunting. I've used a poncho as a dry seat many times at sporting events when the bleachers were wet. That's one reason I keep one in my car, too.

4 Shelter. Most full-size ponchos are big enough to rig into a shelter of either an A-frame or lean-to configuration.