Canvas tent ponderings

[memaquay]

So I've been laid up for almost a month now, and have spent a considerable amount of time on the interweb researching canvas winter tents. Of course, the king of easy setup and general best design is the Snowtrekker, but with the Canadian dollar tanked out, the 10 x 13, tent only with shipping and exchange comes to almost 2000 bucks.

Then I happened upon the Atuk tents, and was looking at one of their unique designs. At only 18 pounds, and half the price of the snowtrekker, it held the lead for quite a while. http://www.atuktents.com/en_kanguk.html
However, my wife doesn't like the looks of it, and I'm hoping to include her in some of these adventures.

I then began to think about Prospector style tents, the ones I have used for years. The thing I don't like about these tents is that set up time can be fairly lengthy and finicky for one person, cutting poles and getting the height right. However, this is Irene's favourite style of tent. With the five foot walls, there is a lot of living space, and head space is usually around 7 feet or more. I went through every tent maker in Canada, and a couple on the US, and I finally came up with this place. http://www.capitalcanvas.ca/WallTents.asp

I emailed the owner. They make an aluminium internal frame (not light weight, around 40 pounds for the frame). He's willing to sell me the 10 x 12 tent with the internal frame for around a 1000 bucks plus tax, shipping is free. It's the best deal I have found in Canadian bucks. It makes for two 40 pound packs, he said the pole pack is about four feet long and a foot around. However, my man hauling days on toboggans are done, I'm saving up for a skidoo. Plus any canoe trips I take in the off season will be low on portages, because I will generally be moose hunting.

So now that I have convinced myself, does anyone have any other suggestions? Has to come in around the same size and price and be self supporting.

 

[Canotrouge]

Wow, that is a heavy tent... Bu the price is sure good! I have a friend that live in a capital canvas tent. Let us know how she worked out!! They say on there web site that they offer an hybrid tent where you have a mix of fabric(nylon/canvas) did you inquire about it? You would save a lot of weight!!

I have a Snowtrekker, and I wouldn't trade it for any thing... Other than a 8 sided 24 inches wall 8 feet at the peak Ethaproof/Ventile tent, that doesn't exist yet....

 

[Iskweo]

I have used bell tents in the summer and they arevery similar to the atuk design. I like them. A prospector tent is nice too, we had heavy canvas modular tents with large internal aluminum frames. A lighter version would be nice. Then you start packing cots, and a stove, a table, it never ends...lol.

 

[memaquay]

They say on there web site that they offer an hybrid tent where you have a mix of fabric(nylon/canvas)

I was looking at that, I'll talk to the guy next week. I'm thinking I'm going to go all canvas, just for the tradition of it, and then use my canoe barrels to hold ice and beer, start tripping with canvas packs again.

 

[Canotrouge]

LoL, That was funny.... But I ain't sending those back...

 

[Dennis]

No Title

I have an 8 x 8' w/2' walls, 8' peak, no internal frame, just a center pole and an external ring at the peak, so if a tree branch is available you can tie a rope to the ring, sling it over the branch and pull up the peak and tie it off, eliminating the center pole. It's gotten a lot of use, lots of winter camping too and never has leaked, it's 14 years old and has held up great. I've considered buying a Range tent to lighten my load but have gotten use to the weight of the 8 x 8'.
http://www.westerncanvas.com This family operation will custom build what anyone wants. My tent definitely isn't light weight though.

 

[oldie moldy]

During the few times I've been at reenactments where there were several different kinds of canvas tents to check out, I've been impressed with how the quality and workmanship can vary. If I were in your quandary, I wouldn't pick any unless I could actually look at and handle them, it would be helpful to hear what somebody who had camped in them had to say. Of course, that would depend on how you'd weight his opinion.

That business of the internal pole system: It kind of makes sense in a way, you'd always have the right poles where ever you decided to camp. You would increase the ease of setup in one aspect with a canvas tent that by it's very nature is awkward and cumbersome. Kinda like putting lipstick on a hippopotamus, sorry but she's still ugly.

Given that the space required is fairly large for any wall tent, could it be an advantage to have sites pre-selected and ready: space cleared and cut poles hidden at each site ready for your arrival? I can surely relate to the pleasure of comfort and ease that a wall/prospector tent will give you but really in the end aren't we talking base camp kind of camping?

It is funny that after all this time our choices seem limited to heavy canvas tents or the lighter and more fragile lightweight modern camping tents.
I guess if I was convinced that my wife really was willing and wanted to go winter camping, then I'd save up for one of those Snowtrekker tents, of all the tents anyone might consider that one is the absolutely proven one.

It's funny, looking back at my life, the times I bought the very best of something, very, very, rarely did I have occasion to regret it. The decisions that still stick in my craw are those where I was trying to get by on the cheap or some b*st*rd compromise that didn't really work anywhere.

Anyways...spring is coming!! Just hang in there and give your foot time to heal.

Best Wishes, Rob

 

[yellowcanoe]

Wish I lived closer. I picked up my Snowtrekker 10x13 shortwall for five hundred USD almost new. I am not using it. Nor do I expect to. Shipping is the problem. I am getting rid of a lot of camping gear that I realistically now will never use.

 

[memaquay]

Very interesting Kim. If you want to make a deal, I would give you considerably more than you paid for it!

 

[yellowcanoe]

I am bedridden now.. Have been for two and a half months. Another month to go.. We will see. Right now I cant think with all the poison in my system how to make it work.

 

[memaquay]

I hope you feel better soon Kim!

Well, after all the sage advise here, and talking it over with my wife, and thinking about what Rob (OM) said, I think the thing to do is save my moolah and wait for the Canadian dollar to go up, and get what I want, which is the snowtrekker. Seems like my ability to make a decision lately is impaired by my desire to complete transaction quickly.

Now, if anyone wants to make a deal on that Osprey I built last year, I could probably be convinced to sell it fairly cheap, in order to pad out the snowtrekker fund.

 

[ppine]

Empathy goes out to all those with physical ailments. I found that even sitting in the back of a truck in the woods with 7 pillows was a grand adventure after not being able to get out of bed for 6 months. To smell the pines, and hear the birds is like going to church.

I have been using a canvas wall tent for 35 years. For the first 30 years I cut poles for it in the bush. Sometimes I would use some 2x4s spliced together. Once in Colorado on a hunting trip we were at 10,000 feet in the oak brush. We could not find a pole 15 feet long for the ridge, so we spliced together two poles to get the thing to work. We had a centerpole but it worked fine. The traditional setup is two sawbucks holding up the ridge. You can add short poles for the sides or just use the guy ropes. The internal pole systems are nice especially in the wind and snow but not required by any means.

Memaquay,
Can you find spruce poles where you are? They are not that big and have little taper which would be good for tent poles. I like lodgepole pine. Then you would only have the weight of the tent for canoe travel.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Totally agree with getting out! We do have plans after I am allowed to stop chemo. And they do include a June loop through Thunder Bay. I'd be happy to take some pix of the tent when we can get to it and then bring it with us.
That is if winter can wait. It has a small stove too. I just hate to see it idle

 

[memaquay]

I would definitely be interested Kim! I'm layed up for at least another month, got cabin fever.

ppine, that is the way I have been setting tents for many years, and I do indeed have a couple of sites where I have stored poles upright against some big spruce trees for over 15 years now. However, I'm liking the speed and easiness of the internal frame tents. My buddy and I had his snowtrekker set up last March with the stove going in probably under an half an hour. The most time was spent gathering bows for the floor.

This was my set up last year for backyard parties. I really like this tent, I think it is original sail cloth, it's so light. Weighs probably about 10 pounds. However, it burns very easily, kind of scares me.



Compare all that pole work to the simplicity of the snowtrekker....more time to shoot the sit around the fire, not all pooped out tent setting, might actually have enough energy to paddle around looking for a moose.


This is my set up this year in the backyard. We have had a ton of fun out there on weekends, people come over just to have a few drinks in the tent. -36 was the coldest night, but as long as the wood is cut small and the stove is roaring, it was t-shirt temps in the tent.


I'm keeping the big wall tents for backyard shenanigans, but want the snowtrekker style for temporary camps, where I might move even daily.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

I think the thing to do is save my moolah . . . . Seems like my ability to make a decision lately is impaired by my desire to complete transaction quickly.

Socrates: "Know thyself."

Good non-decision, Mem.

Since the topic is actually about "pondering" a canvas tent, I have so pondered . . . and have conclusively decided that I have absolutely no need, or even a want, for a canvas tent.

I feel so LIBERATED.

 

[memaquay]

Hmmm, wonder if there is some way we can entice Glenn to want a canvas tent so he can do a multi page, comprehensive review of all the options. Your spiffy canvas pack would provide wonderful picture opportunities sitting in front of a beautiful wall tent.

 

[Rippy]

What about it Glenn? You could use your sarrisa for a ridge pole. One more use for your "ideal canoe accessory". That alone is a good reason to get into a canvas tent.

 

[ppine]

Memaquays set up is exactly the way elk hunters and miners have set up wall tents for 150 years. It is great to see the smaller tents. In Canada it seems much more popular for the stove pipe to come out the door or a wall. Around here canvas tents have smoke holes in the roof with a steel ring or asbestos patch so the pipe goes straight up.

I had my tent set up all last winter. The wind is hard on it, especially the sod flaps abrading on the ground. It was great to be able to go outside and watch the sun on the mountains and build a fire. Many non-believers have not had the experience of the warmth of a canvas tent in any condition with the stove going.

For canoe travel, the 8x8 and 10x10 canvas tents sold in the West of North America go by the name of the "cowboy tipi". They have one center pole to erect and that is it. There are still cow outfits that go out on the wagon for the summer. It is the perfect tent to move a lot because it is so simple. I have a Baker Tent much like Mason's design that is 9x9 feet with the open front. I have often thought of taking it on a canoe trip, but have used it for hunting and fishing trips so far.

 

[memaquay]

I've always liked the look of those Baker tents too. Do you run a stove in yours?

 

[Guest]

I winter primitive camp,sometimes in a canvas tent with stove. It's warmer than home. I have never mixed canoeing and hot tenting.
Turtle