Kayak Academy

Dry Suits

Go jump in a lake. With a drysuit, it's fun!
Swimming in Kokatat Dry Suits

Kokatat Tropos Swift Entry Dry Suit Kokatat Gore-Tex Front Entry Drysuit Kokatat Gore-Tex Meridian Entry Drysuit with womens Drop-seat and Dry-socks women's GME-D Kokatat Goretex Expedition Drysuit, showing dry suit options

Dry Suits in Men's, Women's, and Custom Big & Tall Drysuit Sizes In Stock for Kayaking, Canoeing, Rowing, Fishing, just about any water-sports except SCUBA diving

Kokatat Tropos Swift Entry waterproof/breathable dry suit, only $385.00! Tropos Swift Entry Dry Suit
Kokatat soft neck waterproof/breathable rec paddling suit w/ dry-socks and relief zipper, $469.00 Tropos SuperNova Paddling Suit
Kokatat GFE-R GoreTex Front Entry with Relief Zipper and Dry Socks Kokatat GFE-R
Kokatat Tropos Meridian waterproof/breathable dry suit Tropos Meridian Dry Suit
Kokatat GME-R GoreTex Meridian Entry with Relief Zipper and Dry Socks Kokatat GME-R
Kokatat GEE GoreTex Expedition drysuit with Hood, Relief Zipper and Dry Socks Kokatat GEE

For rental drysuits, click here Rental Dry Suit
For dry suit replacement gaskets click here Dry Suit Gaskets and Tools

Dry suits revolutionize 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 (especially when the dry suit is equipped with optional dry socks attached instead of tight ankle gaskets). You control your warmth with the clothing layer(s) you wear under the dry suit -- the drysuit keeps your clothing dry but it doesn't provide much insulation in or of itself. Men's dry suits can be equipped with waterproof pee zippers and women's suits can have either a waterproof drop seat zipper or front relief system (a lowered front pee zipper used with women's FUD Freshette funnel) so you don't have to take all your gear off when natures calls -- another advantage of dry suits over wet suits.

Gore-Tex and other waterproof/breahable drysuits (for example: Tropos) have further revolutionized the use of drysuits. With GoreTex and Tropos drysuits, unlike purely waterproof suits, your sweat will "breathe" out through the fabric yet the fabric is waterproof enough for surface swimming without water leaking in. (Note we don't sell SCUBA diving dry suits. Diving drysuits cannot be made of waterproof/breathable fabric due to the extra water pressure at depth, dive suits have large, clunky, expensive valves to let air in and out as you dive, and dive suits aren't very comfortable for surface swimming, wadding, walking, kayaking, canoeing, sailing, etc.) With non-breathable dry suits (and even most other brands of suits that are advertised as "breathable", but in reality aren't so much) you get soaked from your own perspiration. Kokatat was the first manufacturer to make a waterproof/breathable drysuit that worked, and Kokatat is still the leader in waterproof-breathable dry suit manufacturing. To learn more about why you should by a Kokatat brand dry suit, click here Why buy a Kokatat drysuit . Otherwise suffice it to say with all we know about drysuits, we proudly specialize in custom fitted and standard sized Kokatat dry suits.

To learn more about the difference between Tropos and GoreTex drysuits, click here Tropos vs. GoreTex .

Call us perfectionists if you want, but we feel if you are going to spend $350.00 to $1200.00 on a piece of gear, it ought to fit and function as well as possible. So we put a lot of our time, expertise, and passion into every suit we sell. On every suit we sell, check the fit against our own proprietary data, 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, work better, and last longer. We are small and personal, but we stock a larger selection of men's and women's Kokatat GoreTex and Tropos drysuit sizes than any other retailer. 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 drysuits 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 (i.e. arms and/or legs shortened for only $20 extra or body lengthened for $70 extra) and most commonly wanted features. 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", and if you need a suit to use right away, we'll even loan you one (and we ship loaner suits) of our rental/loaner dry suits to use (free) while you wait for the manufacturer to build your custom drysuit. So at the Kayak Academy you can have your cake and eat it too! 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 their latest developments. We do more custom option and custom sized orders than any other Kokatat dealer. We do it because we want you to enjoy using your dry suit as much as we enjoy wearing ours (and everyone here owns and wears drysuits), and 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. We have the experience to get it right for you.

Real Fit Charts Have Curves

You've seen fit charts that simply tell you a given size fits anyone from this height to that and this weight to that, but you know it doesn't always work that way. Real fit charts, made from actual trial and error data, have curves -- not strait lines. So instead of simply relying on the manufacturer's sizing table, we've plotted graphs with our own proprietary height, weight, and size data from thousands of clients so as to develop our own system of sizing curves that assure we get you fitted right - we guarantee it. We also offer custom sizing of gaskets and dry socks at no extra charge (Are your feet big or small for your height? If so you'll need custom sized dry socks. Similarly if your wrists or neck are larger or smaller than average for your height you'll want non-standard combinations of suit/gasket sizes so your suit won't leak or choke you).

Drysuit or Spacesuit?

Perhaps you've gathered by now that buying a dry suit isn't as simple as buying a rain coat or pants. It's more like buying your first spacesuit. We wish we could automate the process and sell drysuits via an on-line shopping cart (sure would save us a lot of time), but you wouldn't get as good a suit that way. There are too many judgment calls involved that depend on personal preferences and types of uses. It takes an experienced person willing to talk you through the choices to help you figure out what is best for you. That kind of service is part of what you get when you buy a dry suit from the Kayak Academy, but there's a lot more. Our phone number is at the bottom so you can call and talk directly with George or Barb when you are ready to order a suit, and at any time after buying a suit from us we are always here to help you.

We not only sell a lot of dry suits, we often spend a week or more paddling and camping with the customers we've sold and rented drysuits to. We and our staff have put well over a thousand students into dry suits, and then gone out on the water with them. Over the years you learn a lot about helping customers by being with them day and night while they wear the suit you sold or rented them. I, George Gronseth, (owner and founder of the Kayak Academy) have personally been using dry suits for sea kayaking, river kayaking, white water rafting, sail boarding, and snorkeling / free diving for over twenty years (times about 150 days/year of use which adds up to a lot of personal experience with dry suits), and Barb has about the same number of years experience wearing an even broader selection of dry suit and semi-dry suits for all the same sports. We've sold dry suits for kite boarding, dinghy sailing, wake boarding, jet skiing, sail boarding, metal detecting, white water rafting, canoeing and kayaking. So when we say, "we have experience", it isn't just a slogan, and when you're making an investment as big and complicated as a new dry suit, you don't want to make a mistake. Even if some web site is having a sale, is it worth the risk of wasting hundreds of dollars on a suit that doesn't fit you or doesn't fit your needs? And what if you have a question about using your new dry suit, or a problem with it later? Will they have the experience or take the time to help you? We will, when you buy from us.

If you ever need to send your suit back to Kokatat for repair (other than replacing gaskets which we can do here or you can do yourself with our illustrated instructions), very rare due to Kokatat's high quality but it is possible to cut a suit with a knife or such, we will loan you one of our rental suits while your drysuit is being repaired (provided you bought the suit from us). Kokatat water tests every new GoreTex dry suit to assure there are no leaks, but we go a step further and make an extra five point inspection of every suit before shipping it to you. Even with Kokatat's high quality, we still sometimes catch little things that make a difference in how well a suit performs and how long it lasts. Just another benefit to buying your dry suit from the Kayak Academy. We also include our custom dry suit maintenance/repair kit with George's "Dry Suit Owner's Guide" (instructions for maintenance, field repairs, and washing plus zipper lubricant, gasket protectant, and dry suit soap) with every new drysuit suit we sell.

We offer free shipping (UPS Ground or Priority Mail to the contiguous 48 states, Priority Mail only for AK and HI) within the US for all new dry suit sales. Faster shipping available for an added fee.

We also rent dry suits and will ship rental suits to you for a weekend or an extended trip.

To learn more, see our Drysuit FAQ, click here Drysuit FAQ

Also see Barb's, "Women's Drysuit FAQ", click here Women's Drysuit FAQ

For information on custom options for dry suits, click here Drysuit Options

To view all our dry suit models and prices, go to our Equipment Catalog page Kayak Equipment Catalog and click on the description to see photos and descriptions of each model suit.

For information on what to wear under a dry suit, click here Drysuit Liner

To order a dry suit, call George or Barb toll-free at: 1-866-306-1825
if you are just shopping around, please call us at (206) 527-1825

We stock all sizes of Kokatat replacement latex gaskets, latex dry socks, and the tools to make it easy to replace them yourself. We also carry replacement gaskets and dry socks for most other water-sport dry suits and dry tops.
For information on ordering gaskets and replacement dry socks, click here Gaskets and Tools

Want to make a trade? We sometimes take used drysuits in on trade for credit toward a new suit. Call if you have a suit to trade in.

"I cannot believe it! The USPS delivered a my loaner today, only three days after I purchased the Kokatat drysuit, which is being custom made. Many thanks for the prompt, over-the-top service. Your performance matches your golden reputation" -- JDV

Kayak Academy
11801 188th Ave. SE
Issaquah, WA 98027
(206) 527-1825

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