Tent, tarp or tipi.....oh my

[Yooper906]

One of the things I do to save space is vacuum seal all my survival gear that I know I will never use unless I absolutely have to. I always carry an extra pair of wool socks, hat, gloves and thermals (top and bottom). Vacuum sealed as an entire set they pack down to 1/2" X 11" X 14" flat (think of a 1/2" thick legal size piece of paper) and I slide them down into my water bladder compartment just behind the bladder. Saves a ton of room. You can do this with anything you don't intend on using unless it's an emergency. I do this with my emergency blanket as well and it resides in the same bladder pocket. if you have a packframe convertible pack like a MR or one of the others you can also just sandwich it in-between the pack and the frame along with your vacuum sealed kill kit. You would be amazed at how much room you can free up in your pack by doing this. I run a MR pop up 28 and sandwich the kill kit (4 bags, boning knife, paracord) between the Frame and pack along with my meat tarp, run the wool emergency clothing and emergency blanket in the bladder compartment with the bladder. In that 28L pack I can fit my tent, emergency sleep gear (down hoody, extra long down pants to cover my feet and be cuffed with bands for heat retention), all my day hunting gear, emergency gear, possibles bag, rain gear, fleece, Jetstream vest, 2L water, sh#t shovel, folding saw, Gortex boony hat, day hunt food, knives, two flash light, headlamp and extra batteries. All that and I still have room for my tripod and spotting scope on the side pouches. And that is all in a 28L bag packed for a day scouting trip or day hunt trip. Great setup if I have to spend a night and works well (I have selectively spent the night a handful of times with this setup after an evening kill, knowing the hike out with meat would be more treacherous than just starting a fire, setting camp and getting up in the morning and knocking it out). 25.6lbs total pack weight (food and 2L water bladder included). Weight doesn't include the tripod and scope.

Hunting out of a basecamp this is a great setup but with a bigger pack you can still use a vacuum sealer to save a ton of space. Just remember you should only do this with gear you don't intend to use often. Once it's out of the vacuum seal it's normal size again. You can always find someplace to put it, it's just not gonna be as compact and space saving.

Really good advice! Thanks!

 

[Yooper906]

Luxe tipis, I've been impressed. I seam sealed my own when I got it. They sent the sealer with it. For a 1p tarp shelter that's easily convertable into a large 1p shelter I think you'll have a tough time beating the new Stone Glacier Sky Air.

I noticed one of your older posts about Luxe and the tipi you bought. Care to share pros and cons? The price looks nice compared to some of the other companies.

 

[EYJONAS!]

I noticed one of your older posts about Luxe and the tipi you bought. Care to share pros and cons? The price looks nice compared to some of the other companies.

I was on the fence last year on tents I'd had a few 1p tents but they are like a effn coffin almost when you got your gear in them and the vestibule was loaded. I was tired of climbing over all my stuff and wanted something spacious but light. I was actually considering a hilleberg akto 1p tent. I had a hard time with 600 bucks though. I stumbled across Luxe one day and a picture they had pretty much sold me on the tipi idea.

I have the Hexpeak 2p Tipi with the 1.5p inner. I'm not a tipi expert by any means, it's definitely different with setup and spots to camp compared to a free standing tent. For the price though it's tough to beat 140 for the tipi and 50 bucks for the inner tent is a great bargain.

Pros:
Light weight less than 3lbs combined for a spacious shelter.
Tipi so far has done well during some nasty weather.
Large vestibule for gear
Luxe has been a great company to work with they have great customer service.

Cons:
Only couple negatives I have really fall on me. Setup of these things is key you wanna make sure your intial 4pts when you begin to setup are square or else your gonna get some concaveing on the walls.
You do need a larger area to setup which sometimes is unfortunately difficult to come by.
Condensation can be a bit of a pain but hasn't been horrible.

If your looking for a backpack tipi I recommend them, I'm sure their larger hot tents are very nice to. So far the company has been great to work with which is important to me. Good luck to you