Spec me a tent -

Comfortably fits two :

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Millets have some good deals and their tents are actually decent. I bought a Eurohike 2-man for £33 plus cashback a few months ago and it's great.
 
We have a HiGear Gobi 4 - I chose it mainly because I wanted a tent I could comfortably stand upright in for cooking, dressing etc. We've done a total of a month in it in France in rain, wind, shine, and I'm still utterly pleased with the decision.

http://www.gooutdoors.co.uk/hi-gear-gobi-4-p148802

It's a LOT bigger than it looks on the GO site by the way, here is ours next to the car for scale:

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Lopéz said:
We have a HiGear Gobi 4 - I chose it mainly because I wanted a tent I could comfortably stand upright in for cooking, dressing etc. We've done a total of a month in it in France in rain, wind, shine, and I'm still utterly pleased with the decision.

http://www.gooutdoors.co.uk/hi-gear-gobi-4-p148802

It's a LOT bigger than it looks on the GO site by the way, here is ours next to the car for scale:

Tent.jpg
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You could fit the car in the tent! To be fair though, original Golf's were hardly large!

kd
 
I have a Vango Omega 350 (the expedition version instead of the Beta 350). Tons of room for 2 people and has a massive porch for putting all your kit in.

Definitely recommend having a porch for keeping stuff out your living compartment and provides an area you can take your soaking wet boots and waterproof instead of making everything wet!
 
robz21 said:
I sell this kit for a living, So Email in Trust if you want the honest opinion and some friendly advice :-)

Rob.
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Why, oh why, would you not just share said friendly advice on here, for all to use and benefit from? It's not like there are many distributors of camping equipment that could be in any way considered a competitor of OCUK...
 
Vango tents are pretty decent quality for the cheaper £60-£130 ones, they also tend to be roomier than the other brands, however since I'm guessing you won't be using it all the time I would get a 3 man version for the extra space. Coleman are another cheap brand worth considering. If you have a larger budget circa £250 check out Mountain Hardware tents, I have a Viper 2 and its absolutely fantastic.
 
Jakeee said:
Looking for a decent tent for 2 people, any decent recommendations ? No budget really, got the cash.
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i am guessing that as you are looking at argos, your budget is quite slim ? i took the family camping twice in august. at the beginning and at the end (latest being last weekend into this week). when we camped at the beginning of august a few people near us had the budget argos and halfords tents and these did not stand up well to a night of heavy rain. make sure you get a sewn in groundsheet and tent with a hydrostatic head of 2000mm upwards if you can. you can camp quite happily in the summer with less, but as we get into autumn the weather can turn quite bad, so you may want to consider an HH of 3000/4000mm but, the quality of the tent can be more important than the HH at the budget end.

at the moment, none of the argos tents are appealing, especially as their budget ones are imo rubbish and there mid range are very expensive compared to what you can get from other shops in the sales at the moment. arogs seem to have finished a 60% off sale on tents where for example some of their outwells were around the £150 mark but are now back up to £300. the Vango beta 350/450 can be had for £60-£80 in oswald bailey and millets which would be quite decent. you could go up to a vango icarus 400/500 which will give you a lot more space at about £100-£150.

it is also starting to get quite cold at night and i would say that potentially none of the argos sleeping bags will be worth getting despite some of their fill ratings being 350+. if you must go argos then the Vango Nitezone 350gsm Mummy bag looks like it will be one of the better ones and probably based on a nitestar/wilderness bag from their mainstream range if you are lucky. there is nothing worse than being cold at night when camping as once you get the shivers, it is very hard to get off to sleep esp, if you don't have anymore layers to put on. you want to invest in a good three/four season bag as night time comfort makes a massive difference to the camping experience. for lower budget, i would recommend the vango nitestar 350 or 450 and oswald bailey http://www.oswaldbailey.co.uk/ do these at £30-£50 depending on which store you go to as they all seem to vary.

now is a good time to be tent and camping equipment shopping. millets still have 3 for 2 on sale accessories in store and a decent range of 2011 tents left but you have missed out on some of the crazy bargains which places like B&Q were doing last months to clear out their camping gear.

you should have a choice of oswald bailey, yeomans outdoors www.yeomansoutdoors.co.uk, millets www.millets.co.uk, blacks www.blacks.co.uk (same group as millets but usually has the slightly higher end gear), cotswold outdoor http://www.cotswoldoutdoor.com, field and trek http://www.fieldandtrek.com and sports direct http://www.sportsdirect.com (same group as field and trek and good for cheap accessories atm) on the high street for your gear. you may also have a go outdoors http://www.gooutdoors.co.uk as well and depending on where you live and, if it is one of their larger stores, you should find they have a massive display of tents up to look at.

cotswold outdoor tend to have the higher end gear as well as the budget stuff. they will also price match both local and internet prices on items in stock. not may people realise they can price match on internet prices but they can which makes life a lot easier. if you have the go outdoors member card (costs £5) then they also price match and if cheaper somewhere else inc online, they discount by a further 10% of the item price which can result in a decent saving on more expensive items.

Tldr, don’t buy from argos if you can avoid it as there are plenty of better equipped retail camping shops to go to.
 
Just LOL @ Argos. I would perhaps by one of their tents if I had kids and they wanted to spend one night outside in the middle of a heatwave.

When you get to proper tents, you don't even have to worry about HH (which actually relates more to the floor than the outer parts of the ten), you'll be sitting in 3k HH or more anyway. For reference, 1000mm HH is shower pressure, 1500mm is perfectly adequate for summer camping. If you want an all year tent, 2000mm is the minimum I'd look for.

Zip groundsheet > sewn in for ease of cleaning. I can just pressure wash it off and leave it to dry.
 
We have a Hi gear Atakama 5, used it a few times now and it's really good, all the Hi Gear tents seem to have a hydrostatic head of 3000, i think normally they are rated at between 1500/ 2000, this means you won't get wet when it's tanking down, like it was last time we were camping, it absolutely peed down all night andthe tent was bone dry inside.
 
If you're going for a few nights, then a decent 3 man will be enough. If you plan on staying a week or so, then something bigger with room inside (seating area etc) in case it rains is a good idea.

I have an old Outbound 3 man tent that I bought from Argos when they still made decent cheap tents (~10 years ago). I can put it up within 10 minutes. My bigger tent is a Sunncamp Kashmir 4 man, and that takes at least an hour to put up. I have a queen-sized airbed for use in the Kashmir, and it is literally full queen-sized. :o The main reason I use the small one is convenience really. The 4 man is mch nicer, but a real PITA to use (especially when there's only me putting it up).
 
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Lucero said:
Just LOL @ Argos. I would perhaps by one of their tents if I had kids and they wanted to spend one night outside in the middle of a heatwave.

When you get to proper tents, you don't even have to worry about HH (which actually relates more to the floor than the outer parts of the ten), you'll be sitting in 3k HH or more anyway. For reference, 1000mm HH is shower pressure, 1500mm is perfectly adequate for summer camping. If you want an all year tent, 2000mm is the minimum I'd look for.

Zip groundsheet > sewn in for ease of cleaning. I can just pressure wash it off and leave it to dry.
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lol, not everyone can afford an outwell bear lake 6 like you m8 to get the zip out groundsheet etc :p

the hydrostatic head and the tent quality / tent purpose do seem to go hand in hand so you may find 1000-2000mm HH tents adequate in principal but they are likely to have a lower build quality. ideally you want to aim for an HH of 3000mm -5000mm for autumn through to end of spring as this should rule out the naff, budget (not the same as a decent tent in the sale) or unsuitable tents by default.

danza said:
If you're going for a few nights, then a decent 3 man will be enough. If you plan on staying a week or so, then something bigger with room inside (seating area etc) in case it rains is a good idea.

I have an old Outbound 3 man tent that I bought from Argos when they still made decent cheap tents (~10 years ago). I can put it up within 10 minutes. My bigger tent is a Sunncamp Kashmir 4 man, and that takes at least an hour to put up. I have a queen-sized airbed for use in the Kashmir, and it is literally full queen-sized. :o The main reason I use the small one is convenience really. The 4 man is mch nicer, but a real PITA to use (especially when there's only me putting it up).
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we have an outwell oakland xl (5man) with front extension which is pretty spacious but not uber quick to pitch or decamp and hard going with one person. you can get the tent up and centred on its poles in 20mins or so but then getting all the guy lines and extension set up is another 45mins to an hours work. still it is spacious. it also takes up most of the car boot for just the tents and poles. i would take a smaller fiberglass or alloy pole tent over a large one like the vango omega any day but with a wife and two small children it’s not going to happen.
 
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