When you’ve written a blog for a long time strange things can happen! One of the weirdest is that people seem to be able to pre-empt what you are thinking at any one time!
Comments seem to be particularly prescient. Regular readers will be up to date with recent comments. But the longer you have the blog the greater legacy of material you build up. I spend quite a bit of time corresponding on posts that are several years old!
Take David of the selfpowered blog for example. He appears on the thread for my review of the MLD Duomid. He wonders about the merits of an MLD tarp tent — the Supermid — over the Terra Nova Super Solar. Blow me down, I read this just as I was beginning to contemplate the same things myself.
The Super Solar is a proper tent with an outer, inner tent with bug mesh and ground sheet. It is made of the same lightweight materials as the Laser Competition. As a two person tent it weighs just above two kilograms (or just under 5 pounds). It is lightweight especially when I consider that on my first TGO Challenge I used a Hilleberg Akto which weighed only a few hundred grams less.
As my gear has got lighter there has been an increasing mis-match between solo gear and gear designed for two or us. We do have a double person tarp and that is fine for an odd night out in the summer. But there is no way that Kate is going to use one of these things on something like the Challenge.
Next year’s crossing might be a two person event. So, I’ve been thinking of lighter options.
The MLD Supermid is a two person (or more) affair, more like the size of a Shangri-la/Hex than anything else. Yet MLD’s sinylon is a much lighter fabric than that used by Golite. The Supermid weighs .7 kilograms. Put a two person bug net in and the whole package comes to just about half the weight of the Super Solar. It costs just under £300 which is not a bad price for such a product.
The Supermid is interesting me a lot. It doesn’t have the two vestibules of the SS and it does have a pole that runs through the middle of the sleeping area. But the 2 person bug — which Ron says can be tight for 2 — is actually bigger than the inner tent of the SS. And there is so much room in these teepee tents that it will feel positively spacious.
So, this MLD tent is a real alternative option. The materials might not be as robust although he SS is now showing a little ware!
I think this might be a serious purchase for next year’s Challenge and trip to the Pyrenees.
Its the zeitgeist Andy – its in the ether!! apologies for not checking your posting dates, i’m still playing ketchup on all this, slowly getting the weight down….
concerns on mld are 3 fold:
1. larger footprint, and high sided wind resistance for less than ideal weather situations.
2. mesh inner/groundsheet/bivibag conundrums, which leads directly to:
3. convincing my other half its a good idea!
its entirely possible my concerns are totally unfounded, and they are lovely looking
lovely piks of the music festival btw, really great
Dave,
The Super Solar has a big almost hexagonal footprint (its those vestibules). Personally I’m not worried about this as you always have to find more space for a double tent.
If it was me I’d take a bivy — with Kate it would be a bug nest.
A good idea? It is lightweight! Less to carry.
BTW, you don’t have to worry about these in the winds; they are very stab;e and shed wind from all sides. Wind speeds at ground level are lower anyway.
hi andy been using the shangri-la 3 outer and its great fro me and dog,thinking off getting the solar 2.2 for winter months do you think i cud use the inner in my shangri -la with a bit off string/pegs and making do ????peter
It would certainly fit in the Shangri la 3.
The SS 2.2. inner is freestanding, i.e. the poles suspend the inner tent. It can be used without the fly, which just fits over the top and connects using grommets that attach to the base of the poles. I guess you could have the inner tent inside the SL3 and space for the dog outside. An unusual arrangement, but I guess it would work!
still like the solar 2,2 tent then ?
Yep. You’d have to check the dimensions on the inner but then the SL3 is massive. The only advantage would be it would give you more room outside the inner. But then on other days you could use the 2.2. properly. But why not just buy a nest for the SL?