phil parker wrote:I even remember back from my earliest time of camping when in some instances you would dig a trough around the tent to prevent the water from flowing through!!
Fairly standard practice for patrol tents at Scout camp in the 70s. Everyone was pretty pleased when we graduated to Force 10s for sleeping, but the traditional Nijers were still used for gear dumps, and retained their "gutters".
Yes, it was with the Scout Group that I learnt that practice (of digging troughs - around Nijers) and I took that practice with me on my earlier camping escapades. Indeed, one trip to Borrowdale, where that practice was still commonplace, especially on sloping ground, and having campfires wasn't discouraged, I erected my new [second hand] Good Companion Major, for the three of us - we dug a trench around the tent and it worked from the inclement weather that greeted our first night. I woke up in the morning marvelling at how big the tent was, not realising that I had slid down slope, in my sleeping bag, with more than half of my torso on the outside of the tent - because you didn't have fully zipped doors then as well, just tie cords, and I had slid downwards out of the tent during the night!!
So, after sewn-in ground sheet - came fully zipped doors?! Also great for keeping out the elements and the insects?!
I can only imagine but once upon a time before sewn in groundsheets................ I can recall just wet wet and more wet. Wet sleeping bag wet clothes wet everything. Still enjoyed camping then and still do now. So OP you are in the enviable position of still being young! John
Another vote for them keeping animals and insects out.....my pet hate is mice running around beneath me.....where ever i pitch i get mice!
Another advantage that probably wont apply to many....we were excavating at stonehenge a few years back, camping beside the avon. One day it flooded....we had about 1/2 an hour to move 100 tents and their contents before the river got them. Because they had sewn in ground sheets it mean twe could just hoik the pegs out and drag the tent, inc all contents up the hill in one go......if we'd had to carry all the contents seperatly wed never have saved them all.
I have been in a tent in Scotland watching ticks crawl over the outside of the inner tent. I was glad I could seal myself up against them.
There are plenty of tents available without innners or which pitch outer only so you can use just the fly if you like.
A German cyclists camped with tarp close to me in Glencoe. Next morning my little hook came into good use removing ticks from many parts of his anatomy.
There is your way. There is my way. But there is no "the way".
The wife of my mate once got drunk and had a conversation about ticks in Scotland. It went downhill when she mentioned getting ticks out of strange places on your partner's body. Love is... removing ticks from [ insert part of your anatomy you'd least want to check out].
If you're tent is crawling with them i would not want any way in for them.
Si wrote:Another vote for them keeping animals and insects out.....my pet hate is mice running around beneath me.....where ever i pitch i get mice!
Another advantage that probably wont apply to many....we were excavating at stonehenge a few years back, camping beside the avon. One day it flooded....we had about 1/2 an hour to move 100 tents and their contents before the river got them. Because they had sewn in ground sheets it mean twe could just hoik the pegs out and drag the tent, inc all contents up the hill in one go......if we'd had to carry all the contents seperatly wed never have saved them all.
That's why our ancestors didn't live next to rivers! Let's face it SH isn't going to flood and I've spent far too long climbing to look at archaeology to believe they were as daft as modern society! Does mean you don't get flooded out of many digs! LOL
Convention? what's that then? Airnimal Chameleon touring, Orbit Pro hack, Orbit Photon audax, Focus Mares AX tour, Peugeot Carbon sportive, Owen Blower vintage race - all running Tulio's finest!
I have been in a tent in Scotland watching ticks crawl over the outside of the inner tent. I was glad I could seal myself up against them.
There are plenty of tents available without innners or which pitch outer only so you can use just the fly if you like.
Yep, I'd say it's not just about the weight, but ease of pitch when you have the inner with the groundsheet altogether, it's all there and stays there plus it seals the bugs out. If (if) there's no bugs or risk of heavy rain, just get a tarp or use the flysheet only (if the tent model allows so). In my view, a "tent without groundsheet" is a "shaped tarp".
It is by riding a bicycle that you learn the contours of a country best, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast down them. Thus you remember them as they actually are...
up until the insects come out I usually just carry my old Saunders Jet Packer fly sheet and poles and a Hilleberg groundsheet for weekends away, which usually have me ensconced on some local mountain top
Once the bugs are ubiquitous I prefer to seal them out. Playing Theseus with an ant staring as the minotaur in ones labyrinthine ear is no fun and not a game to repeat.
Searching for, and camping in, places of antiquity and wild beauty. Former ironman, 3PCX, Rough Stuff Fellowship, fell runner, regional time trial champion and 20 odd years of cyclo camping around Europe.
Read an online story about a devil's coachman beetle getting into one tent camper's ear, getting lost and trying to chew its way out through the person's eardrum! That was in a sealed tent as well. You might reduce your chances of a bug attack but not excluded it with a sealed tent.
there's plenty that will munch on the glucose infused, sweat marinated cyclo tourist
I was camped on top of Holme Moss a few years ago awaiting the tour on that majestic day, and noticed what looked like a ovoid seed in the upper epidermis of the soft skin behind my knee....tic
Searching for, and camping in, places of antiquity and wild beauty. Former ironman, 3PCX, Rough Stuff Fellowship, fell runner, regional time trial champion and 20 odd years of cyclo camping around Europe.
