So there I was on the Inca Trail in Peru, I’d just finished the first few miles of the hike to Machu Picchu and it was starting to rain. Rewind a few weeks prior and I’m back in Colorado shopping at my favorite outlet mall on the planet, the Tanger Outlets in Castle Rock. The Tanger Outlets in Castle Rock are unbelievable for outdoor enthusiasts. There is a North Face, a Fjallraven, a Mountain Hardware, a Columbia outlet, and a Arcteryx all in one spot! I’m fairly confident that such a shopping combination does not exist anywhere else for outdoor enthusiasts. Actually, check that, I guess that would be a massive sale at REI, or Backcountry, or Moosejaw or something.
But I digress, so there I am at the Tanger Outlets shopping in the best outlet mall for outdoor enthusiasts getting ready for my trip to Peru to trek the Inca Trail. This would be the first trek of my life, up to this point I had only done day hikes around Colorado, and I needed a raincoat.
Previously, I had purchased a North Face jacket that turned out to be a windbreaker, it was quite a shock to me that it wasn’t a raincoat. Thankfully, I learned that lesson by getting wet walking into a store in Austin, Texas and not on the slopes of a mountain in Colorado. Although that’s just pure luck, as I’d definitely brought that jacket with me as a raincoat when I hiked up Mount Elbert (the second tallest mountain in the continental United States).
In either regard, the lesson was learned, and I was at the Tanger Outlets to buy a raincoat for Peru. My first stop was Arcteryx, where I’d never shopped before.
I walked in the door and the store manager asked me, “Something I can help you with?”
I responded, “I’m looking for a cheap raincoat.”
The store manager laughed and said, “That’s not here, but we do have raincoats.”
I thought “forget that” and walked out headed to the North Face. Who had ever heard of an expensive raincoat? It’s a raincoat, remember that little rubber thing everyone wore as 80’s kids? That hot plastic piece we all used to wear that kept the rain out and us dry (because we were kids and didn’t sweat that much)? That thing couldn’t have been more than $10, now I’m going to spend $1,000 on a Arc’teryx jacket, a brand I’ve never even heard of? No thank you.
So off to North Face I went. FYI, the North Face at the Tanger outlets is one of the greatest stores on earth. They have legit discounts on a lot of technical gear (as well as a lot of last seasons lifestyle stuff, and some stuff made just for the outlet store I’m pretty sure). I explained to one of the people in the store what had happened with my windbreaker and that I needed a cheap raincoat. He pointed me over to a North Face Dryvent jacket, which was sub-$50 on sale if I remember correctly. It was perfect!
Fast forward back to my time in Peru, I’d just finished the first few miles on the Inca Trail, it was still morning and it was beginning to rain. I reached into my Osprey backpack and pulled out my perfect North Face Dryvent jacket. I tossed it on, looking good and feeling great.
By lunch I was drenched!
This isn’t a story of why I love the North Face, although I do quite like the North Face, this is the story of how I fell in love with Arc’teryx. My love for Arc’teryx started in Peru angry that I was wearing a plastic poncho in an attempt to stay dry on the Inca Trail. I looked like a doofus, I was hot under that clear plastic, and I probably smelled just awesome.
Once I was back in Colorado getting ready for my next outdoor adventure I found myself in a Patagonia store grabbing their best GoreTex jacket (their Torrentshell jacket didn’t seem right, which led me to do some research, GoreTex was what I wanted). I bought the Refugio shell which had GoreTex in it. I’m pretty sure that was their flagship, hardcore, weather proof shell jacket of the time. I figured it’s Patagonia, it has to be great! It looked great, it felt great, and it was expensive. It was actually great, except it didn’t keep me dry because the hood was shaped in a way that water hit my face and just went straight down the jacket. So basically it was great at everything except what it was supposed to do.
This led me to spend quite a bit of time on OutdoorGearLab.com trying to figure out a raincoat that actually worked (not just one that was cheap or one from a brand that I knew). To no one’s surprise OutdoorGearLab had rated an Arc’teryx raincoat as the best on the market, specifically the Alpha FL (Fast and Light). Of course, the most expensive raincoat I’d ever heard of was the best raincoat on the market. Granted, the Alpha FL is not by any stretch of the imagination Arc’teryx’s most expensive. At the time it was clocking in at a whopping $475.
So I went back to the Arc’teryx outlet store and picked up a bright red Alpha FL for ~$250. While not the full $475 it was still an amount that stung for a simple rain coat. At the same time though, it was quite literally the last time I was ever wet or overheated during the rain ever again. That Alpha FL has traveled the world with me, and I still wear it eight years later. It’s simple, it works and it works well.
Granted, I’ve added a backup, as well as several other purpose-built shells to my closet. All but one of which is Arc’teryx. But that is how I fell in love with Arc’teryx, it wasn’t about style or cost, it was about value, function and delivery of the purpose that Arc’teryx’s Alpha FL jacket served. It is a piece of clothing that kept me dry in the roughest conditions. Period.