My $50 coleman doesn’t seem to stand up to 40mph snowstorms (who would have thought?) so I’m looking to upgrade. Bulky and heavy is fine. I think at most I’d carry this thing a mile. I’m mainly looking for options that would do well in heavy wind and rain/snow. Would like to be able to stand up in it. I’d be open to options for 2,3, or 4 people. If possible I’d like to stay under $250, but open to going higher.
A tent that does well in the wind is a tent that is as low to the ground as possible. Of course, you have to be able to exist in it comfortably, so how low to the ground is based on what you can handle.
Also, the flys on most cheap car-camping tents these days offer so little coverage they might as well call them “toupees”. Instead, get a tent that has a fly that covers the entire tent, or covers as much of the tent as possible.
I had a relatively cheap Kelty tent that held up very well in storms solely because the fly covered the whole tent.
This year our camping group encountered some 60mph wind gusts. REI Kingdom did not survive, neither did Nemo Wagontop, Northface Wawona, or a Coleman instant cabin tent. My Coleman Skydome died too.
What did survive were: REI Skyward, REI Basecamp, Kodiak canvas tent, Giselle T4 Hub (a pop up that survived), and this pop up 4 person tent that looks like this: https://www.amazon.com/Camping-Waterproof-Surplus-Military-Instant/dp/B08RYX1ZL7/
The last pop up was not wind proof at all, so we sheltered it with a tarp, which is probably why it survived.
Although, I have to say that the Nemo Wagontop, Northface Wawona, and REI Kingdom did collapse, but the poles were just bent, and they were able to be bent back so that they stood for at least the night, even though they were very lopsided and precarious.
The Coleman and Ozark Trail tents all snapped. We ended up crawling into the Coleman with snapped poles to sleep. Luckily, it wasn’t raining very hard, and the Coleman managed to keep us dry even though it wasn’t exactly standing anymore.
As an owner of a Nemo wagontop, REI basecamp and Kodiak canvas… I approve this message
I’ve owned a lot of tents and Kodiak canvas feels like the one for me, other than being heavy it’s a perfect tent
One family from our group was instantly sold and bought one too. I looked into it and really really really considered it, but the package is 100 lbs. While it is broken up into several 30~50 lbs packages, it’s just too much. It takes up a lot of space too. I think it takes up as much space as two cheap Coleman 40 degree sleeping bags