Going Lighter Guide: Shelters II

For this second piece on Shelters I’m looking at all of those products – including tarp tents and tarps – that weigh less than 1 kilogram.

Now, let’s start with some fundamentals. If I can now buy a two-skinned tent for 900 grams or so (the Laser Competition) why should I even consider looking at a tarp/bivy combination that is only a little lighter? A fair question that. Two things to consider here.

Firstly, the move towards the tarp opens up a whole new outdoors experience. If you love wild camping then using a tarp – during some parts of the year – makes a great deal of sense. Being in the open means a closer connection with the landscape. You can watch wildlife at close hand in a way that you can’t in a tent. There are the starry skies at night; is there no better way to drop off to sleep than watching the sun dipping over the horizon and the stars beginning to sparkle? What about mornings spent morning, watching the sun beginning to rise, seeing the shape and the form of the hills taking shape? Tarp mornings are truly invigorating. There’s no such thing as a lie in or a late start when you’re using a tarp. So – the attraction of these pieces of gear is not just that they are light; they offer a truly different kind of outdoor experience.

But, secondly, there is an issue about weight – more subtle than it might appear at first hand. Earlier on in this series I talked about the 10 kilogram barrier, the almost magic point when loads just seem to get significantly lower. The lighter you go the law of diminishing returns does kick in. You do have to work harder to loose smaller amounts of weight. But it may well be worth it. Consider a backpacking trip, a long weekend, or a week or two perhaps. Supplies – food, fuel and sometimes water – have to be carried. Supplies are heavy. But using some of these lighter gear configurations means that – for many trips – it is possible to get the total load down below 10 kilograms. Most gear guides quote base weights before supplies are added. But three or four days of food can weigh quite a lot. Suddenly your nine kilogram load can be up and over twelve. Get the whole thing down below 10 kilograms and you’ve literally transformed the backpacking experience.

Tarp Tents

As we dip down in weight the first thing we come to a tarp tents. Most often, these days, tarp tents are single skin tents, sometimes utilising bug netting to make them more useful to use in the summer months. Henry Shires Tarp Tents are amongst the market leaders. Increasingly Henry’s tarp tents have become more like single skin tents. New models have sewn in ground sheets and ‘beaks’ – pieces of material that protect the opening of the tent – that not only keep out the weather but provide a greater degree of privacy.

Tarp Tents are lighter, but only a little lighter. Here we’re talking about 700 grams or so only 200-250 grams lighter than the Competition. But in this world of diminishing returns that weight might make a big difference when combined with a wider, lightweight strategy. And tarp tents allow you to gaze up to those skies.

Golite is a mainstream manufacturer who embrace tarp tents in a big way and who have an entirely new range due out in 2008. the Golite tarp tents have no groundsheet sewn in and so you need to factor in the additional weight of a groundsheet or bivy bag, the latter being the most common here in the UK.

A mainstream Bivy Bag – such as the popular Rab Survival Zone – will weight about 400 grams. Combining this with a 700 gram tarp tent takes you well into the Competition area. But when tarp tents start being used by two people the weight savings become more significant. A two-person shelter for less than 1.5 kilograms is significant.

Tarp tents are, most often, not as robust as standard tents, and more car needs to be taken in finding camping spots at the end of the day. But some such as the Golite Hex – a kind of teepie style tent – is apparently well capable of taking a real pounding from the wind. There have been some attempts to create tarp tents out of very light material – such as spinnaker fabric – but these seem to be less than successful when used in the UK. Chris Townsend was not a great fan of the Gossamer Gear version of the Henry Shires Squall, which is made out of Spinnaker fabric. Gossamer Gear also produce the Spinnshelter which is their own, more simple, tarp tent design, also made out of spinnaker. The Spinnshelter works rather like the Golite Hut – it is essentially a tarp with a front door and a back door! I’ve seen the Spinnshelter at first had a few times and I must admit that it doesn’t appeal to me. Alpine walker Judy Armstrong found that she had difficulties keeping the Spinnshelter taught in wind. Colin Ibbotson ended up removing the additional flaps and utilising the shelter as a basic tarp.

The Tarp

Tarp Tents obviously have their attractions and may have a place on the road map towards lighter weight backpacking. But, personally, I would prefer to go straight to the tarp.

A 10 by 8 tarp – often described as a two-person shelter – is positively cavernous. Two people can easily get themselves and their gear under this size of shelter. And the size means more protection; with this sized tarp you are almost assured of keeping yourself out of the rain. And yet a tarp this size still preserves that open-air feeling. You can still gaze out on those stars.

Currently, my main tarp is made out of spinnaker fabric and is roughly 10 by 8. Yet it weighs only 270 grams. With lightweight pegs and a lightweight bivy my shelter weight is below 500 grams. Not bad for such a wonderful, open-air experience.

One other thing about the tarp; they take up a lot less space in your pack. I can get my bulkier synylon tarp (backpackinglight.co.uk), pegs, Rab Survival Zone bivy ,and food for a couple of days, into my ULA Relay pack. The Relay would be considered by many people as a day pack – it weighs only 350 grams. And yet this pack takes this load easily. And an overnighter – or weekender – using this kind of arrangement is a really exciting, and different, experience.

Extreme Materials

Tarps are becoming even lighter as they utilise more modern materials. Spinnaker fabric is used extensively in extreme sailing conditions. The fabric is very light and very strong – ideal for use in tarps. I’ve never felt exposed at all in my Spinnaker tarp, and I’ve had it in some nasty conditions. Incidentally, Spinnaker has a reputation for being noisy in the wind. I’ve not found it to be any noisier than any of my tents – and that also seems to be the experience of Ron Bell at Mountain Laurel (who made my tarp for me).

But we can now go even lighter using cuben fibre. Cuben fibre is also used a lot in the sailing world. This is exceptionally light and strong, although you have to be a little more careful with it as it can puncture easily. It is weird stuff cuben fibre. It is kind of translucent and is very synthetic looking. It looks like a kind of wafer thin glass fibre. Yet this fibre is waterproof and can provide all of the protection that you need.

A single person cuben fibre tarp can come in at a little over 100 grams. Combining it with a lightweight bivy, and using lightweight chord and pegs, your total load is well below 400 grams. And a 10 by 8 sized tarp made of cuben fibre is not far behind. Suddenly, the target of under 10 kilograms for kit AND supplies is well within reach.

Tarp Limitations

There are, of course, limitations is the use of tarps. Summer can be a bad time with midgies and insects but the problem can be mitigated to a large extent by acquiring a lightweight bivy with an insect hood, or by using one of an increasingly popular bug ‘nests’. I’ve got my eye on a bug nest from Mountain Laurel which is no heavier than their bivy bags. The stuff is not so robust as standard camping gear but you soon get used to using it with a little care.

Siting is also a limitation, although maybe as not as much as you may think. Tarps can be remarkably resilient. They can be pitched, very effectively, as wind-breaks, by pegging the sides that are into the wind down to the ground. And if the weather is really stormy – or swirling – you can pitch the tarp down lower than usual. But you’ll be dry and safe.

Tarps do take longer to put up than tents. For example, I can set up my Akto almost blindfold, and in no time at all. With a tarp you often have to think through the way your going to pitch it. And finding the right piece of flat ground – for a bigger tarp – can be an interesting experience. And you need to be aware of sites that can be flooded by running water where the built in bathtub floor of a tent would give you total protection. Flat tarps can be configured in many different ways and I’ll often spend half an hour or so playing with different shapes and adjusting the pegging until I’m happy with my configuration.

Bob Cartwright’s Tarp Video (backpackinglight.co.uk) shows you everything you need to know about putting up a tarp and includes an excellent visual guide to a range of useful knots.

Catenary cut tarps are a little more easy to put up although they are perhaps not as flexible as flat tarps. Simply, these tarps have different dimensions at each end which allows for an easier and taught pitch. A caternary-cut tarp can be erected remarkably quickly. The design and manufacture of catenary tarps are more complicated but they’re becoming increasingly popular. I happily use such a tarp these days and don’t feel the lack of flexibility to be too much of a problem.

Why Carry the Weight of a Tarp?

You can, of course, dispense with the tarp completely and rely on just a bivy bag. The bivy gives us the ultimate outdoor experience – everyone should read Ronald Turnball’s ‘Book of the Bivy’ (Cicerone). But in our climate you’ll often want more protection from the wind and the rain. And in sunnier places you’ll want protection from the sun. An overnighter using a bivy is a great experience but opportunities are limited. But here in the UK if you’re using a tarp you’ll more than likely to be using it with a bivy and so there will be times when the tarp can be left behind.

Why Not Explore the World of the Tarp?

So, to end this contribution; why not consider using a tarp? Tarps offer the wild camper a much expanded outdoor experience. They are fun and they weigh less. I suppose that here in the UK tarps are more of an outdoor luxury, but if you like making camp and making use of the the long days, then they make a lot of sense.

An overnighter using a tarp and a bushbuddy wood burning stove – simply outdoors perfection.

You do need to think through the use of a tarp. As I write I’m mulling over using as tarp on next year’s TGO Challenge. I’m still not sure. I might not be able to camp as high. And on the Challenge I find that I walk long days. Sometimes the ability to simply throw up the tent and get the food quickly quickly is worth carrying the extra weight. But, still, I might just get around to it.

Exploring the world of lightweight shelters does mean spending money on pieces of kit with more limited usage. But it is fun and all part of the lightweight journey. Personally, I’d by-pass the tarp tent stage and go straight to one of the larger tarps. They take a bit of practice to use but after a couple of overnighters you’ll find you become confident and proficient at erecting your new shelter.

If tarps catch your imagination then don’t hesitate. Go and try them for yourselves.