Another "help me choose a tent" thread -- Outwell Ohio XL, Florida 6 or Montana 6?

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We have, sort of, narrowed down our options to an Outwell tunnel tent. And from there I think that through considerations of layout, size, etc., I've narrowed it down further to the three above-named.

Any thoughts? The Montana is the cheapest option, but we would be prepared to pay the extra if the others are that much better. There are four of us at the moment -- DH, me, DS (4.5) and DD (1.5). There might or might not be a third DC at some point.

I suppose I'm looking for experiences with any of these tents, or suggestions of factors we ought to be considering. But if anyone wants to tell me that we've got completely the wrong idea and need to start from scratch, feel free to do that as well .

And should I be swayed by the fact that Outdoor Action are offering a free kids' room with the Florida or Montana? Are the kids' rooms really any good?

They're just not my bag. There are plenty though who love them.

cor blimey the Ohio and Florida are bigguns aren't they?

No personal experience of any of them I'm afraid

do you really want a mocha tent though? bleurgh

They aren't as bigguns as some, mind you. I eliminated anything with a dimension over 7m, and I was surprised how many there were of those.

Yes, I tend towards thinking the kids' rooms are a bit... well... twee. DS is quite psyched up enough by camping in the first place without needing coloured basketball gamey things.

I am probably leaning towards the Montana, but I know DH and suspect he will lean towards the behemoths other two.

I would like a nice cheerful brightly coloured tent, ideally. Maybe I shall have too invest in windbreaks just to add a little colour to our lives...

Argh! to, not too

at the windbreaks.

I like the Monty myself (out of your 3). Nice straight forward, sensible, sturdy and GREEN tent. Does what is says on the tin.

Have you checked out the pack size dimensions and weights? Will the mofos fit in your car with all the rest of your stuff?

I wouldn't recommend a too brightly coloured tent. We've got the Outwell Nevada M and one of the things I love about it, is that it is light beige, which gives you an almost natural light inside, so it's fab on rainy days.

For a spot of colour we got the kid's room to go with it though. (And no matter which Outwell tent, you should get the kid's room, too, it rocks!) I don't think it's twee, it looks nice, and a child will no doubt find it exciting.

Just to throw a spanner in the works, have you looked at any of the Gelert tents?

We are a family of 5, I have never camped before the weekend just past (but dh has when he was younger) and he immediately ruled out 5-man tents or even 6-man tents for us as they would be too small. Have to say he was right! We have an 8man tent now "Gelert Horizon 8", with 2 sleeping "ends" which technically sleeps 8. Comfortably, though, each end would sleep 3 in airmattresses. We had dd1 in her own little "bedroom", dds 2 and 3, squeezed in a bit, were in another "bedroom" next to dd1 and dh and i were on a double airbed at the other end of the tent. We could have fitted another single airbed into our section comfortably I think.]

My sister came camping with us and has a 5man tent (for her and her dp) and have to say there is no way on earth we would have fitted in it!

sorry - don't think my post has helped you at all !

even

Think I'll give up on that one then!

You see, with DS I probably want an inner room that's sedating, rather than exciting. Now that I would pay extra for . But DD manages to be excited without quite so much danger to life and limb, and I can quite see that she'd like the kids' room so I may have to suck up DS's excited-to-the-point-of-spontaneous-human-combustion-ness.

I hadn't thought about the light colour, but of course what you say makes perfect sense. I've just got used to the idea (from smaller tent) that inside light is necessarily orange, but I suppose it doesn't have to be that way .

fgs - wasn't a smiley there just now, hence another post! Sorry again

2 are mahooosive aren't they?
The Montana is still big..but not the same scale as the other 2.
I don't know...it depends how much room you want ..whether or not it is for long trips or not i guess.Also whether or not you have other children/age gaps and whether or not you want separate rooms for them or not.
We have a monty 6 for long trips and i find it too big/heavy/much work for shorter ones. We have a smaller tent for weekends. There are 4 of us..I have a 12 year old and a 6 year old.
I saw one of those Ohio ones recently at a campsite and it looked so big with 4 people rattling around in it.
They are all excellent tents btw...it's just what one will suit

No help whatsoever am i !

Now I am a comfirmed minimalist after one WHOLE weekend of camping with hardly anything I can now say with the assurance that minimalism brings that children do not need a wnaky 'kids' room with fluro reeevolting colours and a mesh inner roof with a hole in to throw a ball through to have an exciting time camping.

Camping is quintessentially exciting for a child, they do not need extra stuff. Hell they don't even need a clean pair of pants [packing malfunction].

What do you use for weekends?

he he he

I am a minimalist evangalist now.

I bought a couple of these last week

They are brilliant

We've only bought the mahoosive tent including wakny kids room and fitted carpet as we want to use it for longer holidays, too and I'd go crazy if I was tentbound in the rain in our mountain tent for 2 week.

We're new to car camping as in the past we only went small and light weight so that we could carry the tent up mountains on our backs, but the babe will be a wee bit too small for that for a while, so we might as well make ourselves comfortable. It's still cheaper than renting a cottage.

I wouldn't touch a pop up tent though, as they don't seem to cope very well with wind and rain, judging from the skips of most campites we used.

Buying cheap tents is usually false economy.

Yes, at present we have three-man tent which is comfortable for two and doable for three but (unsurprisingly) just won't work for four of us. So it's either keep sending subsets of the family off on their own mini-trips or bite the bullet with a proper mahoosive or semi-mahoosive tent.

I am feeling very tempted by the Monty. Monty is a nice nickname, after all . And it comes with a free kids' room and is a bit cheaper than the other two (without being cheap) so I can feel as though we're saving money by not spending quite as much as we could have spent. And it looks from eBay as though it holds its value well, so if it turns out to be insufficiently enormous we could sell it on and upgrade. I think we'll probably want to change five years or so anyway, as right now I want the DCs' sleeping compartment next to ours but when they are older I am likely to want it at the other end of the tent, so can probably live with less mahoosiveness at the moment (car isn't huge, either).

Probably we are only looking at doing one week at a time in the UK. Although DH did spend a long time on Saturday talking to a friend of a friend about three-week camping holidays in Germany (foaf was raving about the quality of German campsites), so who knows...

oooh, widowwadman, i've got my eye on a nevada. my sister has the iowa in a pale green and it's quite beautiful in daylight. (a little light in the mornings, though, she reports, so i wonder if that might be the advantage of the kids room. are they darker?)

how many of you are in the nevada? i want me, dh and the two wee ones to be able to sleep in the 4 man bit, is that madness?

Nevada M is 5 man so would probably work.

Ignore Slubber the kids room IS fab.

Aitchiswaitingforalegalopinion At the moment it's only 3 of us, me, my partner and our 8month old daughter.

We've so far always slept all 3 of us in the bigger bed room (bought the kids room for use when she's older, but put it up anyway). The 3 man room has plenty of space (and the Littlelife Arc 2 travel cot works well in it, as it curves in the same way as the tent wall.

I think it's roomy enough for a family of four. A few weeks ago we went camping with the inlaws, and when it rained all four (well, 5) of us ended up in our living space, as it was roomier than theirs.

The kid's is just nice looking. The roof is darker (with a starry sky), so it is supposed to keep the nippers from waking early, but whether that really works we've yet to find out. It certainly is slightly darker than the other room. I like the little mouse-hole door in it best.

bof!

Washer, no it isn't. It is deeply horrid and offends me on many levels...of course if we had one the dds would utterly ignore my aesthetic and consumerism-gone-mad principles and think it was marvellous..but that is children for you. No taste or principles.

Still if you were getting one free then

I'm quite tempted by the Nevada. Has anyone got a picture of the kids room?

No need to find a picture as I've found one and I want a Nevada M with a kids room. Can't find one in stock though.

so do you think the four person bedroom would be big enough for two double airbeds?

mollieo, i know, i was thinking 'oh i'll pick one up in the sales' but will i buggery, they're all sold out now.

h yes sorry it's the nevada l i want. four berth and two berth. hopefully we can use the two berth for storage until we can get the children in there and reclaim the bedroom.