No. Wool is not the warmest, or the best. I've used wool alot longer than any of the synthetics I use. It is warm when wet. But it has only 50% of it thermal effeciency when wet. What's even more important is that it dries no where near as fast as the best synthetics. Try using a quality wool base layer and then try a Patagonia Capliene base layer in it's place. You'll notice that wool of the same thickness is a bit warmer, but it dries out no where near as fast as capliene. When it come to insulation layers, it also depends on whose synthetics you use. Just like the base layer. I've used quality wool as an insulation layer literally all my life. But nothing comes even close to Patagonia's Regulator series when it comes to warmth and ability to dry quickly. In otherwords, there is a wide variation as to how well fleece does the job. I've got several Polartec and Cabela's Fleece items. None of them dry nearly as fast or stay warm when really wet like wool. Like many have said, you need to stay dry. That means you need to deal with both the inner storm and the outer storm. The outer storm is far easier to deal with than the inner storm. E
