Cool Camping. Laura James
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Buy the best you can
Buy the best tent you can afford and never buy a tent without first having seen it up.
Hot advice…
If you’re camping somewhere you’re likely to get chilly, then line the base of your tent with a metallic safety blanket. Shiny side up, it’ll reflect your body heat back into the tent.
Look for funky colours
Tents are often made in rather uninspiring colours, but you can hunt out some pretty ones. Cath Kidston makes gorgeous patterned ones for Millets.
The joy of text
If you’re camping at a large campsite or festival, it’s a good idea to put a flag on your tent. Orange developed a tent that lit up when you sent it a text message. Sadly, so far no one has made it commercially.
Make it your own
If you want to customise your tent make sure you do it safely. Paint and hangings can damage the waterproofing. A helium balloon flying from the top is always rather sweet, as is bunting.
Be prepared
Check the weight of the tent before you buy it. If you’re travelling by car and can park right next to your pitch it’s not an issue. If you’re hiking up a large hill it most definitely is.
Keep bedding dry
Store your bedding in a bin bag to ensure that it doesn’t get wet when you’re making camp. There are few things as depressing as being out all day only to find yourself sleeping in a soggy bed when it’s time to turn in.
Frame
These are the most like a house. They’re large and you can walk around freely as there’s enough headroom. Usually they have a number of separate rooms.
Vis-a-vis
This means the tent has a bedroom at each side of the living area.
Pyramid
These are triangular in shape and are easy to erect because they have a central pole.
Ridge
Traditional triangular tents, which are sturdy and offer a lot of headroom. Their weakness is that the sides are unsupported.
Lightweight/dome
The most suitable tents for backpackers as they’re compact and aren’t heavy. Dome tents come in larger sizes for families or those who want to camp in a crowd.
Geodesic
These tents are similar to the dome variety, but because they have a different pole configuration they’re sturdier in high winds.
Hoop
These are like a cross between a ridge tent and a dome tent. They’re lightweight, spacious and are good in windy conditions.
Inflatables
An ingenious invention, as you don’t have to go through the palaver of erecting the tent, you simply blow it up with a foot pump.
Picture credit: The North Face
tipi or not tipi?
Everyone should sleep in a tipi at least once. Their combination of elegance and practicality, and the way they allow one to gaze at the stars at night, make them truly romantic and my favourite camping structure.
The magic of sleeping in a tipi is almost indescribable. Watching the stars through the open smoke flaps, while lying next to a roaring fire, is a wonderful experience. The tipi is probably the most elegant and graceful of all temporary structures and its beauty lies in its simplicity.
Phil Royle, from tipi.co.uk, who made my tipi, sums it up brilliantly. “Take twelve sticks, tie them together, wrap the canvas around, secure with more sticks and hang the lining. This is the recipe for a wonderful living space.
“Tipis are cool in the summer and in the winter, all you need to do is light a fire and you’ll be perfectly cosy.“
Tipis are available in various sizes. Mine is 16ft in diameter and sleeps six adults comfortably. One of the joys of a tipi is that it’s made from proper canvas, so smells delicious when new. It also takes on the gorgeous scent of wood smoke.
Most tipis are made from canvas that is waterproof and rot-proof. You can also usually pay extra to have your canvas fire-proofed as well.
How you floor your tipi is a matter of choice. Many like the natural look, but others prefer coir matting or tons of rugs over a plastic groundsheet. I like to do half-and-half and have the back of the tipi (where we sleep) covered and the front (where we eat, play games and generally hang out) left bare.
Tipis offer a flexible space that you can easily style to reflect your personality. This applies to the outside, too. Many tipi makers offer colour canvas options. My tipi is mainly white, but has pink smoke flaps, which look lovely.
Picture credit: The Tipi Company
One of the great advantages of a tipi, is that you can have a fire in it. If you don’t want to light one directly on the ground, you can have a wood-burning stove, a fire bowl or a cast-iron chiminea. Drifting off to sleep in a tipi, while the fire crackles, is an intensely relaxing experience.
The shape of the tipi, as well as being practical, has spiritual significance. According to Greg Bramford, from The Tipi Company, “traditionally the tipi was a temple as well as a home. The floor of the tipi represented the earth on which we live, the walls the sky, and the poles the trails from earth to the spirit world, the links between man and the great mystery”.
There are a number of places where you can go and camp in a tipi. Many are included in the listings section. Also, there are companies who hire out tipis and will erect them at a site of your choosing. This can be a campsite, field or festival.
“I used to hire tipis for guests to sleep in when I had parties in the countryside,” says designer Alice Temperley. “Then, a few years ago, I broke my shoulder rather badly and was bed-bound for a couple of months. When I was allowed to get up, my husband walked me to the orchard and he had bought me a tipi with coloured ribbons hanging from the poles. It is the most romantic gift I have ever had.
“In the summer, I sleep in my tipi whenever I go home to Somerset for the weekend. I have a big Balinese bed in there and lots of sheepskin, so it’s a little luxury countryside retreat.
“I love tipis because they are just so special. Romantic and spacious and whenever I sleep in one I feel as if I’m not in the English countryside, but some magical place somewhere that cannot be explained, really.”
Glastonbury festival’s Emily Eavis says: “I love tipis. A tipi is the most beautiful place to camp.