Hands. I started using gloves during the winter of 2004-5 for desert hiking but I’m convinced they are useful year round. Gloves are fairly light. They are well worth the extra weight. Gloves are useful for grabbing cold rocks, providing protection and extra friction when crossing steep sandstone, pushing away brush when traveling off trail, picking up a hot pan, shading hands from sunburn, protecting hands from biting insects, keeping hands warm during a cold night, and the obvious, keeping hands warm during winter hikes. REI One Gloves. Size: Large. Weight: 88g. Quick Summary: Tough glove for off trail travel crossing sandstone and pushing brush away. Although these gloves were expensive when I bought my first pair at $46, REI may be discontinuing them because I’ve been able to get them for less than $15 on sale. They have a warm fleece liner, tough leather palms, and are water resistant. They are great for grabbing cold rocks, providing protection and extra friction when crossing steep sandstone, pushing away brush when traveling off trail, and picking up a hot pan. After several months of using them, the palms show significant wear but they still have a lot of life left in them. They are less useful for keeping hands warm during winter hikes because they make it hard to operate a camera or GPS. When I’m actively hiking in temperatures down to about 15° F, I prefer using Patagonia Lightweight Capilene Glove Liners. If I don’t plan on using the camera much, perhaps during the return leg of a day hike or I will be grabbing rocks or brush, I put them back on. Patagonia Lightweight Capilene Glove Liners. Size: Large. Weight: 25g. Quick Summary: Favorite winter glove while hiking actively. These are my favorite gloves when I’m hiking on trails during cold months. They are sufficiently warm down to about 15° F when I’m hiking actively. The wind can penetrate these gloves easily. I don’t use them for my only glove but at less than 1 oz for a pair, they don’t add much weight to my pack when I’m not wearing them. The biggest advantage is they are the only gloves I can wear and easily operate a camera. Since photography is a very important part of my hiking experience, this is very important to me. I use black gloves so the desert sun can help warm my hands even with low temperatures. The Capilene cloth dries very fast, especially with the black color. If it starts getting extremely cold, I pull the REI One Gloves over these Patagonia liners which serve as just a base layer. Heavy Weight Fleece Gloves. Size: Large. Weight: 56g. Quick Summary: Fleece gloves are a poor choice. I have some simple REI branded ones without reinforced palms. Some Scott Gloves with reinforced palms. Gloves with reinforced palms can weigh twice as much and aren’t worth the extra weight. I think a fleece mitten is a better choice.