Another shelter thread - best light combo?

Great tarp pictures runningboar and ming65!

Darkhawk424 - Thanks for the Hammock comments! Running water on non-level ground during a sudden rain event can be another great reason for a hammock.

Regarding the bug net. Where I tend to camp, it is generally cool enough at night that I always use a sleeping bag. So it is really only the head area that is plagued with bugs. Wearing a bug jacket in your sleeping bag can help this. However, it is a bit claustrophobic and depending on how you sleep, sometimes the mesh will get close enough to your skin that the mosquitos can reach through and get you in the exposed spots.
 
Hi all,
This last weekend went camping on some land that my sister owns.
We had a warm spell for a couple of days. temps were in the upper 50s and into the 60s. nights got chilly one of my water bottles had ice in it the next morning ( Saturday ) . I used a canvas tarp for the leanto that I made with it. I used a blue poly tarp that I normally cover my ATV with for the ground cloth and you can see in these pics.

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In this pic I put my wiggy bag in there to. The poncho liner is for my dog Kelly Girl that is her blanket LOL.

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The canvas tarp is 6' by 8' and I set it up between 2 small trees they were about 7.5' apart. I used two blue shock cords as the tie offs to the 2 trees and this works really good I think. To keep the tarp staked down I just carved some walnut stakes and then used my axe that I got from Brian Andrews as seen in the pics to drive the stakes throught the eye lets and into the ground.

On Satuerday my nephew and one of his friends wanted to come and camp. So I had to rearange the tarp to fit all of us under it . Well I just turned the tarp. The tarp when staked out length wise there is a lot of sag in the middle of it. So to remidy that I took a log that was about 8" thick and about 5.5' long and rolled it up to the end where the staked part was at and that lifts the tarp up in the middle. Well it does enough for me anyways LOL
Here are a couple of pics.

In this pic I used my poncho as a side wall.

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This pic shows what the log rolled up against the walnut stakes I carved looks like

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LOL I did the changes with the tarp and then my nephew and his freind decided to stay home and watch movies. So it was just Kelly Girl and me again for saturday nights camping.
I am a fan of this type of set up. I did not have to use bug net since it is winter here.

I have used canvas tarp for years. They do weigh some but they are so durable. I really do not back pack in Neb. so weight is not really and issue.


Well I just thought I would share the pics of this leanto shelter I used for a couple of great days of being out in nature over this last weekend.

Bryan
 
Kgd....

I use all types of shelters for all types of locations.... but if wee are talking lightweight.... I'll give you a few of my set-ups...

Summer - I pack a Hennessey Hammock... super light, super fast, airy, keeps the skeeters out and is just plain comfortable. I also sleep under the stars quite a bit.

Fall/Winter/Spring - O.R. bivy bag... I find it to be a warmer set-up when combined with a groundpad and a good sleeping bag. In the winter I add a good sized tarp.


That is just my lightweight stuff.... normally, I prefer to combine traditional and modern, gear which weighs a little more but gives me a better experience.

Rick
 
Magnussen said:
Kgd....

I use all types of shelters for all types of locations.... but if wee are talking lightweight.... I'll give you a few of my set-ups...

Summer - I pack a Hennessey Hammock... super light, super fast, airy, keeps the skeeters out and is just plain comfortable. I also sleep under the stars quite a bit.

Fall/Winter/Spring - O.R. bivy bag... I find it to be a warmer set-up when combined with a groundpad and a good sleeping bag. In the winter I add a good sized tarp.


That is just my lightweight stuff.... normally, I prefer to combine traditional and modern, gear which weighs a little more but gives me a better experience.

Rick
Click to expand...

In the winter when you're not sleeping in a snow shelter?
 
Good to know Rick. For the bivy set-up in the winter, is condensation an issue during below freezing weather? Do you use a vapor barrier inside your sleeping bag to prevent condensation/frost forming within the insulating layer of your sleeping bag?

Thanks for your info
 
I generally go for a silnylon tarp myself...I don't have the pics available right now but tomorrow I will post up some winter snow/tarp shelter pics.

The only time I haven't been satisfied with a tarp was in extremely buggy conditions. But I am starting to think that a lightweight 4-season tent with a stove jack might be worth having.

I just came back from a three-day trip into the mountains and ran a wood stove every night and while it was nice, I think a more enclosed (but still ventilated of course) setup with a stove jack would just be killer, especially if you had other people with you. I was by myself and don't mind the cold much but the gf would probably prefer the comfort aspects of a tent.

That said, 3 seasons of the year I know she also likes the tarp setup.

Great thread!
 
I'll add a few cents worth from down under...I have several tents, summer tent that is 3-4 seasons, big roomy and the one the missus insists we take when we are (car) camping.

The other tent is a swerius f season mountain capable tent, i have slept on mountains in the rain and pitched on snow works atreat, however it is heavy.
I aslso always use a thermarest and usually a bivvy bag as well, the bivy bag helps keeping my down sleeping bag clean ans stops me rolling off the thermarest in the night, I use a inner witha mosquito net for inside the sleeping bag too.
This set up is not light, but it gives you the advantage of room, it has twin vestibules for cooking in if the weather turns and is very very waterproof, plus gives you options if you are there with the ladies...

Oh and I have slept in the bivy bag sans tent - once in the open when it got too dark to continue tramping, and once when I slept in a snow cave I built, they work fine.

Hammocks with a tarp is the way i would go moving forward, something like a mosquito hammock or a clark hammock (spelling?).
Look damn fine, waterproof, bug proof, and you do not need to worry about flat ground, if you have ever slept in a tent on a slope you will know what I am talking about - its not fun!
Having a good hammock, combined with a thermarest in cold weather would allow you to sep up anywhere you can find two stong uprights (trees, poles, fence and tree, cars, cars and tree etc etc), ther better ones can be used as a bivvy bag if you can not find two uprights, are light and fast to set up & take down, there are even doubles now for those romantics out there...

So in short - if weight and time is no problem then (as long as you can find a flat spot) then a tent is very versatile, however if weight and time and flat ground is a problem then a hammock would be my choice.

A hammock
 
Thanks kgd

Sicily02 nice pic and set up. Do you have any with your bugnet "installed" too i would like some ideas on how do you put it in Thanks!

I just thought of another disadvantage of tarp and hammock user.

Watch out for any object above you eg. dead branches, pinecones, birds or coconut.

Once i was about to set up my hammock when a coconut fell not far from where i was about to hang... looking up i saw alot of coconut which was ripe and about to fall...

your friends wont want to find out that you have a coconut for a head in the morning... plus any bird doing their business wont see where they do it... if you hang without any tarp well, you might get lucky. :D
 
Thanks darkhawk...I'm told that 'death by coconut' is actually quite common. I'd imagine that a tarp, either one over the hammock or a tarp on its own would at least absorb some of the shock of a coconut drop, at least keeping it from being lethal. Still might play havoc with your shelter even for a tent.

Those were some cool pics Bryan!
 
Dark hawk424 No I do not have a pic of the tarp and netting set up, but what I do is, I have a netting that is a rectangle shape and I just tie off the corners to where ever I find convenet to ie on the tarp it self. like the groment holes. then I just crawl in under it and tuck the netting around my sleeping pad and bed roll.
It keeps the little blood suckers off me and I get what ever breeze there is to.

Ken thanks I really had a good time sleeping out this last weekend under that canvas tarp. I have used them for years. They are a little heayer than other tarps but I do not back pack far distances. so carrying it has nver really been a problem.

Bryan
 
Those were some awesome pictures Misanthropist. Maybe you can add the link to your thread in your post above!
 
Sicily02 thanks i also thought of something like that and was looking out for other methods. When it rain will rain flow throught the groment and down the netting?
Thanks
 
darkhawk424, I do not remember it ever doing that. I do remember one time years ago that I set up my tarp. and it rained like crazy through the night. the ground got so satuerated, that rain ran right onto my ground cloth. I had it just laying on the ground like in the pics I posted above. That sucked LOL. My blanket got wet. It was nice and sunny the next day so it dried out, but if I think there is going to be rain now I will use a few logs a couple of inches in diameter and and put them under the edges of my ground cloth all the way around me and that really keeps the rain from getting onto my ground cloth. I have done that twice. You know sometimes when it rains so hard the ground can not drink in the rain, and it pools on top of the ground and then flows where ever the ground is lowest.
Have you ever made a tic bed? Grampa calls them that. But what it is,
is when you take a tarp or poncho or blanket and fold it over and sew up the ends lenght wise and then you can take a couple of poles a little longer than you are tall and put them on a log at the foot end and then the head end and that will keep you of the ground. you can also stuff whatever in between the folded over material and that will give you some more insulation.
I have also taken my tarps and tied off the at middle and then had a covering on each side. 2 slanted sides is what I mean. like a A frame tent. an then put my netting in and tie off the corners.

If I get a chance I will rig it up and take a couple of pic thursday and post them backup here. of what I mean.

I hope all that made sense LOL.

Pics are so much better and I do not think I explain my self very well.
Hope that helps LOL

Bryan
 
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This is a Hennessy Hammock without the rain fly.

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This is with the rainfly. It weighs only 2 pounds 8 ounces.

I spend about 4 months during the summer in it hiking Mammoth Cave National Park.

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If you wanna packlite, this is the way to go.
 
Thanks hope you can get the pictures up soon cant wait.

I get what you mean by the your log method but i am not so sure about the tic bed. sounds to me its like a A-frame bed only that its on lower grounds and there is no need for the frame.

thanks
 
darkhawk424 I did not get a chance to set up the tarp and the netting today, but I remember that a freind of mine use to do the same thing as I did but he took 4 sticks and drove them in to the ground at the corners of his bed roll and then tied off the the corners of his netting to them. The sticks were in under his tarp and so if it rained then that would not be a problem anyways. My freind had a habbit of going back and forth from his GI hammock and the tarp set up.

I on the other hand just tied my netting off to my tarp. Sorry I did not get the pics. I just did not have the time today.

Bryan
 
always been a tarp fan....

<a href="http://s154.photobucket.com/albums/s276/m48shooter/?action=view&current=islandcampingjan2009040.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i154.photobucket.com/albums/s276/m48shooter/islandcampingjan2009040.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

the boys have been biten by the bivy bug and im going to try mine out on my glades trip... i get some pics and reviews... the bug are killer down here so i'm liking the thought... we wil see
 
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