Coleman Sundome

About 5/6 years ago I had purchased a tent from my American friend Mitch.I think for Rs 2,000. He had brought it for his India trip (done with my Bullet) as an emergency back up. He never used it. I bought it from him alongwith an air mattress. 

Ever since, it was gathering dust at home because I never felt the need for a tent. I never even got the courage to try and pitch it as an experiment. I was curious but wasn't confident enough. Also I thought trying to do it on a field in the city would attract a lot of casual onlookers who would make a million and one stray comments. I avoided that. I was convinced that you need to pitch the tent on the field using stakes. I had no idea what a "free standing tent"meant. 

A few days ago I had it brought over from our house in Haridevpur to try my hand at pitching it at home. Having watched youtube videos I have learnt that one does not need to use stakes for a casual pitching of these tents.

After camping for several days on our way to Roopkund I thought I might as well check it out. At Bedni Bugyal we were in fact given a demonstration of how to pitch a tent. Also, I am now looking forward to more involved trekking in Indian Himalayas where carrying one's own tent from home is a must. Most Indian treks happen in places where there are no villages. People use hired tents but their qualities will always be suspect.

I must admit that I could pitch the tent successfully only after two aborted attempts. The first time I laid the tent on the drawing room floor and did everything as shown on youtube videos but I could not understand how to fix the poles so that they would stand erect. They were sliding down on the floor and going flat. 

This is a free standing tent meaning the poles don't have to be fixed to the ground and theoretically should be able to stand on its own even on a smooth floor. But it didn't happen on the first day. Anyway, I was happy to note that the tent was really big and not a one man tent. It was pretty heavy for its size though. 

What I discovered to my pleasant surprise was that packing the tent back into its bag wasn't a problem at all. It took me just a few minutes to do the job. You just have to ensure that air is pushed out of the tent as you roll it up. Initially I was more worried about packing it back than pitching it. 

I tried one more time to see if there were some sleeves or pockets in the four corners where I could slide the ends of the poles but found there was none. So I packed it back a second time. 

Last night I discovered something new from a Coleman video which solved my problem. You actually have to insert the pins attached to the rings in the four corners of the tent into the hollow ends of the poles. So once again Monisha and I tried our luck. 

And lo and behold - the tent was up. In virtually no time :-)  I was simply ecstatic. We called Mampu and entered our tent for the first time, in our drawing room. I did not spread the fly sheet because a. fly sheets need stakes to be fixed b. rolling the fly sheet back into its thin holder is a pain. We had to do that on the first day.

We were impressed by the amount of floor space available inside the tent and had a jolly good time looking at the various features of the tent. We even found a few ear plugs in a side pocket of the tent. 

Now let me give you my impressions about the tent. 

Let's get one thing clear right away. This tent is not meant for a full fledged Himalayan trek where it could rain or snow at any time. I doubt how it will hold against a strong wind either. So let's accept this as a fair-weather tent only and not expect too much in terms of protection in bad weather. The zips are not the strongest and you cannot give it to porters to pitch or un-pitch. They will ruin the zips in no time. 

To stay with the negatives of the tent, this tent also does not have any ground sheet. If you are seriously planning to use it regularly in the wild, get a decent ground sheet in size 72"x72" because the floor is 78"x78". Your ground sheet should be slightly smaller than the footprint of your tent, otherwise it will collect water in a rain.

Now among the good things about the tent. It is pretty large. The tent we used in Roopkund for the three of us was smaller than this. This one can comfortably accommodate three people and in a pinch 4 can also fit in. 

The door is adequate. a little raised from the floor level so that creepy crawlies cannot just enter the tent. There is a small plastic sheet on the ground outside the door (attached to the floor) presumably for leaving your shoes out. It also has a small window behind near the head (assuming you sleep with the legs pointed towards the door), almost at the floor level that you can open to check the weather outside or to get a cup of morning tea (if someone is available to serve it to you). 

The top half of the tent is of a net like material. Hopefully this will allow better humidity management inside. But this also means the tent offers no privacy without the fly sheet. 

When we packed the tent back inside the cover, we decided let's get the cover straightened out. Mitch had stuffed the tent with the cover inside out. As we turned the inside out we found there was a detailed instruction sheet stitched to the cover. If I had seen this earlier I could have easily worked out how to pitch it in one go. 

So here are the pros and cons of the tent once again 

Pros - 

- ridiculously cheap

- spacious

- easy to pitch and un-pitch

- easy to pack back in its cover

Cons

- not the strongest materials

- may not work in rain or snow

- zips should be handled very carefully

- poles are light but did not seem very strong

- relatively heavy

- packed size is much larger than similar sized but more expensive tents 

- cannot be stuff packed (like a down sleeping bag) 

Bottomline - keep it in the car as an emergency back up for long distance trips but don't take it on a Himalayan trek.