[pct-l] RE: Lunar Solo tent - condensation

[msaenz at mve-architects.com (Mike Saenz)]

well...
MY tent (sniff and snobbery) doesn't condensate!

;)


At least it hasn't to the point that I've noticed...

I remember back when (old fart's story coming up) I spent 4 hours in the
worst storm I've ever seen in the bowl below Dallas Peak, camped along
the shore of Blue Lake (bottom lake) in Colorado...The day was bright,
clear, sunny and warm. We base camped here and had spent the day
climbing up and over into Yankee Boy Basin, then did the ascent up Mt
Sneffels. We got back to camp and while we were lounging around watching
our dinner cook, my buddy looked at his altimeter watch (one of those
spiffy barometric altimeter/thermometer/chronograph Suunto jobs), then
he frowned. Then he tapped on it. Then said something like: "that's
strange, I've never seen the barometer trend down so fast..." At that
moment, we could see tendrils of clouds creeping down over the edge
ridge of the bowl...
An hour later, lighting, thunder, ROCK SLIDES (we could here timber
snapping....and we were AT tree line!) and rain so heavy that my tent
was in 2" of water...and it was pitched on a slope! This went on for
four hours and at one point, my buddy could see lightning striking the
ridge above us. He said he could see the lightning striking the ridge
with the trees around us silhouetted by the flashes...then he could see
the lightning striking BETWEEN us and those trees! Yikes! He yell out to
me "Get out of your tent!, get out of your tent!". He was worried that
the lightning would strike our campsite, so we huddled in a depression
while we watched the lightning, shook by the thunder and got scared
sh*tless by the sound of the rock slides all around us! (that is the
absolute worst, most terrifying sound I've ever heard). When the storm
subsided enough that we felt safe to get back into tents, it was still
raining very hard and my tent developed a slow drip at the very apex of
the roof. Drip.....drip.....drip.... I eventually had to drape a bandana
between the mesh inner wall and the fly to get the drip to roll off to
the side, and draped myself with my rain jacket (since then, I've
applied seam seal and haven't had a leak since). The storm rolled away
just as abruptly as it began and bright moonlight kept me as awake as
the thunder did.
The next morning, we woke to find that the lake had risen 2 feet, a new
stream had been carved into the bowl wall, the existing streams had
widened from something you could hop across to 20 to 30 yards wide! And
VW sized boulders at the edge of the lake that weren't there the day
before (and about 75 yards away from where we camped...).

BUT- no condensation!

Photos of Blue Lake and Dallas Peak (along with Mt Sneffels & The
Keyhole) in my album ("Oilcan") in the
SoCal Backpacker Yahoo Group Site:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/so_california_backpackers/

All said and done, I'm still lusting after Ron's Lunar tent!!!!!


M i c h a e l   S a e n z
McLarand Vasquez Emsiek & Partners, Inc.
A r c h i t e c t u r e    P l a n n i n g    I n t e r i o r s
w  w  w  .  m  v  e  -  a  r  c  h  i  t  e  c  t  s  .  c  o  m


-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Courtway [mailto:scourtway@bpa-arch.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, December 14, 2004 10:07 AM
To: Mike Saenz
Cc: pct-l
Subject: Re: Lunar Solo tent - condensation

> #2, however, conflicts with #1- in that- if you have a very well 
> ventilated tent and the temps don't get too low, you won't condensate.


Not necessarily true oilcan.   As it has been written and folks have
experienced, myself included mid June vic. Muir Pass this year, due to
weather conditions, sometimes you cannot avoid condensation.  I hope
nobody misinterpreted my post about the tarptent as a bad review, as it
was simply an observance of the nervousness as I approached "the edge"
with a down bag without the most water resistant shell, and tarptent in
conditions in which condensation simply could not be avoided, no matter
how breezy and well placed your site was. Folks have mentioned that the
2 person tent maybe better as far as room is concerned, and I'd
definately agree with this, standing 6'-6" and loving to thrash about
and toss and turn as I get used to sleeping at 10,000 ft.  I may need a
bag with a more resistant shell next time I'm out there lightweight
mountaineer I mean hiking. heh heh.

s.c.