How to have a miserable camping trip: Advise on what tents you should avoid.
Jun 09 '05
The Bottom Line Look for quality materials and a well thought out design.
This story is an example of why I think campers should invest in high quality camping equipment.
And an additional warning is warranted, there is dry sarcastic humor present. So don’t complain that I didn’t warn ya. : )
The story
My wife and I woke up at 3:30 in the morning and left at 4:30 in the morning so that we could get to Death Valley early enough to get a site at Furnace Creek. Over the phone they said that some non-reservable spots might be available at 9 am. Well when we got there we found out that all of the spots were reserved and none would be available. So we went down the road to Texas Springs and found a great spot where all the boys (and one girl) could play freely without disturbing other campers and there wasn’t much around that they could destroy. It really was a good spot except for a slight slope to the site and some erosion at the far end. At that point I was glad we got up early and thought we were going to have an enjoyable weekend.
Even at that time it was windy, 10 mph winds with 20 mph gusts. (Later that afternoon the gusts got to 40 mph (I think more) with 15-20 mph winds in between.) Within a half hour of arriving at the campground I noticed a fellow camper’s tent was about to be blown away. Two stakes had come out of the ground and it would have blown away within the hour had I not done anything. So being a good neighbor I went ahead and hammered in the two stakes as best as I could. The problem was that the rain fly they put up. The rain fly was acting like a kite and literally lifting the tent off the ground. Also the couple that was using the tent only hammered in their stakes 1/4 of the way in (and they were the Coleman stakes that only work if they are hammered into the ground all the way (depending on soil type and other conditions.) So I hammered them in all the way into the hard desert ground and that kept the tent in place. Sadly that wasn't enough because that afternoon at 5 the entire tent had collapsed because of the wind. My guess is the pressure from the rain fly was too much for the poles that were holding up the tent. (for reference, their tent was a Coleman).
About an hour or so after we arrived, my in-laws arrived. We set up the tents and paid for our 3 nights. For the most part we relaxed, talked, and let my two children play. I was still optimistic that the weekend would go smoothly, I would soon find out how wrong I was.
That afternoon I went for a walk with my children to survey the damage in our small campground and I noticed that a total of 4 tents and 1 shelter had collapsed. This was literally half of the tents that were set up that day. Later that afternoon the couple with the shelter trashed the shelter in the trash bin. An older couple was smart enough to leave their tent down until the wind died down.
Well, when we went walking back to our campsite my father-in-law noticed that their Coleman Weathermaster tent had fallen over. He surveyed it and found a small tear in the tent. He wisely decided to let the wind die down a little before trying to set the tent back up again. About 45 minutes passed, the wind died down, and we felt it was safe to set up the tent again. We did and the tent held together. It did have a few rips in it but nothing significant that would cause the tent to spontaneously collapse on it’s own accord.
Well we got a gust of wind about 5 minutes after we set it up, the tent made a big ripping sound, and collapsed right on my father-in-law. Needless to say he was not the happiest person at that moment. I tried to keep an optimistic outlook on the situation and told my father-in-law that he now had multiple exits out of his tent instead of the usual one (with him being trapped in the tent at the moment I thought that would instantly cheer anyone up in his situation). He remained silent to that fact so he never verbally confirmed his appreciation to me for sharing the information so I’m sure that meant he appreciated my comment.
He eventually crawled out of one of the openings of the tent (I don’t remember which one) and proceeded to survey the damage. It took him about 5 seconds before he asked me if I had a knife. I knew this was a rhetorical question but I just replied “how big?” I pulled out my knife collection and he of course took my cold steel knife and proceeded to dismantle the tent with it. Why? Well it is a normal cathartic reaction to dismantle tents that are going into the trash bin. And besides, I am not going to be the one to tell a man with a knife that Catharses does not work in relieving stress.
Well it gets worse. They were planning on using their mattress to sleep on under the tree in our site. Well my wife grabbed it and was holding on to it when a big gust came by and blew it away. I was amazed at the speed of that mattress in the wind. I never thought a mattress could go that fast or fly that high. It probably would have made a cool kite if we had string and a big anchor. It was ¼ mile away in less than a minute. There was no way a human could match that speed on the rough desert ground, even if there wasn’t any gorges. The last I saw of the mattress was when if flew down a chasm about ½ mile away.
Some of you will remember that this is the very same tent design that my son and nephew ran into and ripped last August, but that time my brother-in-law owned the tent. What I want you to take with you from this experience is that when you buy a tent there needs to be a certain amount of flexibility in the design. Without this the high winds and very active children will always find a way to damage it.
The only tents that survived were small backpacking style tents that were well designed (that typical cross pole design and low to the ground profile) or tents with guy wires that were flexible enough to bounce back from the gusts. Any tent that was too rigid would not withstand those winds. Now that brings us to my tent and how it handled the abuse.
My tent (REI Basecamp 6) did very well considering it was not designed for this type of abuse. It did sustain minor damage to the stitching and the poles. I used some guy wires on it and that helped a little but not much. My tent is not designed for high winds but it did very well for a tent with a high profile. Its cross pole design and flexible nature allowed it to deal with all but the strongest gusts. The strongest gusts caused the side of the tent to temporarily collapse on the mattresses and right itself up again after the gust stopped. The only permanent damage was to the poles but they are still usable and I have no intention of buying new ones. The one mistake I made was I probably should have used the rain fly with the Guy wires on it to deflect some of the force of the wind and that may have saved some of the abuse on the tent stitching and poles. I plan on setting up the tent and use a seam sealant on it again because I know all of the seams have been pulled, especially the loops.
But other than those minor points of damage, my tent stayed up. I was a little worried at first but it held together as all moderately priced tents should.
That night there were at least 4 cars that had people sleeping in them. The next morning I asked my mother-in-law how she slept and she said that once she arranged the blankets properly it was not too bad. My father-in-law remained silent and began to make coffee.
After talking to my sister-in-law, she felt it was best that they not come up and my in-laws were going home (they didn’t like the idea of sleeping in a car for 2 more nights, and I don’t blame them). Since the point was for my wife's family members to spend time together with their grandchildren/nephews/niece, I felt no desire to spend the next 3 days/2 nights there with my core family since there is little in Death Valley to do with 2 young kids (and deal with 20 mph gusts at the same time.) So we also left the following day and headed home.
We went out the southeast exit the next day, saw some of the sites in Death Valley. That afternoon we stopped by the Mojave Preserve visitor center (the preserve is immediately south of Baker) and found that they had the same weather conditions that Death Valley did. The park ranger told me stories of campers that had their tent fly away in the wind and massive dust storms in parts of the preserve. So instead of stopping there and dealing with the same problems, we just continued down the 15 and went home. I finished playing KotOR 1 and started on KotOR 2 before going to work in a few days.
My in-laws went straight to REI and called us for advise. We weren’t home yet so we couldn’t advise them. We called them back when we got in that night and found out that they actually bought the Basecamp 6 thinking we had the Basecamp 4. They were a little surprised to find they bought the same tent we own, but it should meet their needs (I was disappointed in their purchase only because I don’t get to review another tent for a long time).
Another story on why you should buy a good tent.
In 1984 my mother, brother, and I went on a trip to Florida. My mother had bought a cheap 4-man tent to save some money. She thought it would last the 2 months that we were gone for. Well it did not. By the time we got through Texas (about 2 weeks) and entered Louisiana for the worlds fair there was 2 major holes in the tent and the poles elastic had broken. We had to slide the pole pieces one at a time through the pole sleeves so they connected properly.
These issues did not deter us; we just made the best of it and continued to set the tent up as best we could. Well at the other side of Louisiana a week later we were in a massive storm and my brother woke up floating in an inch of water. My brother did not appreciate his bratty little brother telling him he wet his bed (I was on the other side, uphill, so I was dry). Water had traveled downhill (above our campsite) and entered into one of the holes and filled up one side of the tent. From that point forward both holes had to be facing downhill to avoid getting filled up with water for the following 5 weeks. This tent was also destroyed at the end of our trip.
And another
This is actually a good story. My wife and I were in Arches and we set up our REI Clipper in a nice little area of our campsite that was smooth and rock free. Problem was it was in a depression. Well we went out to explore the park when a freak rainstorm occurred. We got back to camp later to find the tent was in a pool of water. I thought everything was soaked inside. I waded in with my boots and found that everything inside the tent was bone dry. My wife and I simply lifted the tent out of the pool of water and re-staked it in a new place. The reason was the bottom was one waterproof piece of fabric and it went up about 10 inches on the side. So the seams that connected the bottom and top pieces were above the pool of water. A lot of cheaper tents are not designed like that and have seams at ground level. And they may skimp on the fabric quality.
The true bottom line
In most cases, you get what you pay for. If you buy a cheap, mass produced tent then expect it to fall apart within a short period of time. If you buy a more expensive tent from a true outdoors store then you can expect it to last longer and react better under more severe conditions. These tents have better stitching, better design, and more expensive/stronger materials. That is unless you like buying new tents every 2-3 years, which is what happened with both my father-in-law and brother-in-law. I on the other hand have spent the same amount of money (or less) over the same time period and I still have a functioning tent.
I highly recommend shopping at an outdoors store such as REI that has a good collection of proven tents. REI, Northface, and MSR are all brands I recommend, but there are many other good companies out there.
As far as Coleman products are concerned, I only recommend their stove’s and lanterns. Unlike their tents, these are great products that have been proven time and time again. In fact they work so well I think some of the designs haven’t changed for the past 30 years. Some products are ok to use like their stakes (but there are better out there) but I would never recommend a Coleman tent because they are usually mass-produced and quality control is not always there. This recommendation I have for Coleman is the same for the other companies that manufacturer cheap tents in large quantities.
Bulleted suggestions
· Don’t be afraid to spend the money on a quality product
· Buy from an outdoors store that has knowledgeable salespeople.
· Pick a flexible design, not rigid poles that are prone to breaking.
· Usually a design with poles that cross is a better design.
· If you do not need the height, buy a tent with a low ceiling.
· Seam seal your tent.
· Pick a rain fly that completely covers the tent (not one that acts like a kite.)
· Replace the stakes that come with the tent.
· The bottom piece should be a solid piece of canvas/fabric and come up 10-12 inches to protect you from flooding.
Other reviews & guides you might be interested in.
Yakko’s guide on family tents
Yakko’s guide on Oakley Sunglasses
Coleman Weathermaster tent
REI Basecamp 6 tent
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.