We returned home from our last trip with a few casualties. Things aren't made to last like they used to be I guess. To be fair nothing actually broke while we were away I only discovered they were broken when I laid the tent out to dry. While it was drying I dug out the mud that accumulates in the ends of the poles. I'll not go into why mud gets into the poles here it's too complicated but it's to do with our slightly odd pitching technique. While digging the mud out I discovered that the elastic had broken in one of the poles. Checking the others for wear I found that there were a couple more that were on their way out too.

This is a little concerning as the tent is only 12 months old, does the tent pole shock chord wear out that fast normally? Anyhow I have found some replacement chord that is the right length. The poles are 6.66m long and the kits I found have 13.5m of chord in so enough for 2 poles. I've sent for the kits but I think they're on back order. I'll let you know how easy it was to replace the chords once I've done it.

The second breakage was our mallet. It's a cheap as chips mallet from Millets so I guess I shouldn't be that surprised but again it's only a year old and to break after such a short period of time is disappointing. Well at least I get an excuse to buy a new mallet for next year.

The last thing did in fact break before we left. All of the extra large stuffsacs we bought a couple of weeks back burst the seem around the bottom. Not enough to make them useless but annoying nevertheless. They are something else that will need mending over the winter.  Interestingly the large stuffsacs we bought at the same time and which look the same (apart from the size) were fine, despite being stuffed fuller than the extra large ones.

All this fixing and making good will give me something to do over the winter months at least.