How we ended up with a giant family tent from Europe

As a family, we spent our first Week of Rivers (the Carolina Canoe Club‘s annual 9 day event in Western NC) staying in a cabin, instead of camping.  I missed the community aspect of the event and have been thinking about how to make camping at WOR work with a toddler.  While I could readily envision camping with a toddler in good weather, I just didn’t know how it would work if we had a rainy week.  And as whitewater paddlers, we’re always hoping for rain.  I decided we needed a dry place for M. to play in case of sustained rains.

I spent a great deal of time researching and looking for small pop up campers.  Unfortunately, there are not a lot made that are under 1500 pounds, which was my limit with our current vehicle.  There were many more to chose from even 5-10 years ago.  Furthermore, I didn’t have a good place to store even a small pop up.  We would need something like a Sylvansport GO or Livin’ Lite Quicksilver 6.0.  Both proved hard to find used and I wasn’t convinced they would meet our needs at WOR.  On the advice of friend and GO owner, I started looking at tents.  I found lists of “cool” tents (such as this one) and image searched tents that interested me, which lead me to the Lotus Belle.  A beautiful and functional tent, but one that didn’t meet our specific needs (but if I ever rent a campground site for a summer, I plan to get one of these instead of an RV).  Then I started researching “family” tents and found the Paha Que Perry Mesa.  This was much closer to what I was looking for, but I wasn’t sure I’d be able to put it up without help and it was no longer available.  Most “family” tents in the USA are lower end tents, with a few exceptions (e.g., the REI Kingdom).

Lotus Belle

All of this internet “research” led me to wish list of tent features.  I wanted a tent:

  1. With room for M. to play,
  2. Preferably with two rooms,
  3. With height enough for me to be able to stand comfortably,
  4. With both rooms having a bathtub floor,
  5. For the tent to be made from excellent materials and construction to withstand sustained rains, winds, and soggy conditions, and
  6. I wanted to be able to set it up myself.

It didn’t need to be easy for me to do it myself, it just needed to be possible since I am a single mom.  I started Googling and searching for tents similar to the Perry Mesa.  Reverse image searches of random tents that looked interesting, led me to looking at European tents.  The family tents available in Europe are nothing like what’s available in the US.  Many tents made from high quality materials and designs that simply aren’t available here.  I spent too many hours on Camping World’s website debating on whether it made sense to buy a tent from the UK and have it shipped here.  And if I did decide to move forward, what tent would I want?  While I could find no tent in the US that met all my needs, there were many options available from Camping World.  I read reviews, poured over company websites and finially decided to go for it and buy the Outwell Tomcat 5SA tent.  SA stands for Smart Air, which means that the tent has connect air tubes instead of poles and you can pitch (inflate) the tent by pumping up the tube from a single inlet (there are multiple air outlets for quick deflation).  When I ordered the tent, I was confident it met the first five items on my list and I was pretty sure I would be able to pitch it myself after watching YouTube videos.

It arrived! and the Outwell 5SA is vastly larger than any 5 person tent sold in the US.  It has plenty of room for M. to play in its three rooms, the rooms have bathtub floors, has height enough for someone over 6 feet to stand comfortably in, and is made from quality materials.  I decided to spend the extra money to get the Smart Air system and I am glad I did, because I pitched the tent myself in about 20 minutes.  Granted, I didn’t stake out the guy lines or put up the awning (there wasn’t room in my backyard!), but I was thrilled I was able set it up solo and quickly right out of the roller bag.

I can’t wait for Week of Rivers!

Outwell 5SA Tent

 

 

My next post will be photos and a description of setting up the tent in the back yard.