I enjoy the outdoors. In 2015 I discovered I liked walking so much that I signed up to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro. I didn’t train (I lived in a flat country), I hadn’t ever really camped before, and I had never done a hike of that distance or at that altitude.
It was awesome!
I have since become more outdoorsy and spend most days walking, cycling, running or hiking. And now, I want to add camping to the list.
I hope to document my journey here, with an emphasis on gear.
Lets kick things off with the tent.
So after much deliberation, I settled on a tent. Those of you in the Good, Bad and Ugly tent thread would have seen that I am a little indecisive…
I bought the Naturehike P-Series 2-man tent in white.
It was between this, the Cloud Up-2, and the Mongar.
I settled on the Professional Series/P-Series after assembling a First Ascent Starlight and seeing they had a similar shape and dimensions, and the price was also attractive. Bought on special for around R1600. While I hope to camp fairly regularly, it didn’t make sense spending on something like the Mongar this early in the game.
First impressions
This tent is light! My el-cheapo bathroom scale said it is 2.1kg. I should have used the kitchen scale- it would have been more accurate.
The tent arrived in a layer of bubble-wrap, paper, and plastic. It was a bit like pass-the-parcel tearing the layers off.
Once unwrapped, its white bag with blue accents was super compact and gave a feeling of minimalism.
I took it into the garden to set it up.
Set-up
Set up took less than 10 minutes. The poles snap together with magnets (cool!), and they clip in easily to the plastic clips of the tent. My last tent you still had to thread the poles through the fabric sections, which invariably bunched up and caused much frustration!
The tent is light and small enough to pick up with one hand and position it to your liking.
Throwing the flysheet over was easy, and it clips in to the groundsheet at each corner. It also has two roof-top vents.
Boom, done!
Interior
I quickly climbed in and found the interior to be quite roomy. At 1.76m I have loads of headroom when I lie down, and I can comfortably sit cross-legged and have my head clear the roof.
There are mesh storage pockets on each end, and the the vestibule has ample storage space. Should I wish to share my tent with another person, I reckon I could comfortably do so.
Now, one reason I considered the Mongar was because of the dual entrances and dual vestibules.
The P-Series showed that it also has two vestibules, but only one entrance.
So imagine my surprise when I turned around and saw another door, the same size as the entrance, that opens into the other vestibule.
And I was even more surprised when I realized hey! You can unzip that vestibule too!
It only has a single zip, so securing it with the pegs and using it for access might not be ideal, but it isn’t impossible. Whereas the main entrance has two zips.
I was so surprised I checked that I had the right tent.
Score!
All the photos on the website only show the front, and the description only says “dual vestibules for gear”.
Exterior
I wasn’t too keen on the white. I would have preferred a darker green, or even the orange. But the orange was sold out, and the only other options were bright green or bright blue. I wanted the darker green so that it would blend in more with the environment, but then again, I guess orange would have stuck out as much as the white. I am sure I will get used to it.
But the white gives a clean look, with grey accents and blue rope loops to secure the tent with pegs.
When it gets dark I will see how much the inside of the tent lights up, and whether or not bystanders will see a silhouette of whoever is inside.
The zips feel good - smooth movement and solid.
Conclusion
So far so good. I am excited to test it out, even if it is just going to be in the garden for now!
