We're off for our first camp of the year over the MayDay Bank Holiday weekend. We did the same last year and like then we're going away as part of a family group. Last year there were four tents and a caravan and as I blogged at the time it was an Outwell outing. This year things are going to be different as they'll only be two Outwells. Of the other 'Outwellers' one has bought a larger Aztec and the others (you might want to sit down and brace yourselves for this) have bought a caravan.
The caravan purchase raised the topic of tent alternatives amongst the rest of us at a barbecue yesterday and got me thinking. Firstly why would you want to camp in something other than a tent? Well the main reason was sleeping on the ground and I have to admit I do agree with this one. So what are the alternatives. Well basically 3; caravan, trailer tent, camper van. The two disadvantages of all three of these are cost (they are all substantially more expensive than a tent) and storage (you won't fit any of them in the understairs cupboard which is where our tent is stored over the winter).
From a cost point of view trailer tents are caravans are quite similar and camper vans are the most expensive. Camper vans have the added disadvantage of all the ongoing costs associated with owning a car, MOT, insurance and (unless you get an old one like a split screen VW) Vehicle Excise Duty (car tax). From a storage point of view you'll need a big drive to keep a caravan or camper van. A trailer tent might fit in a garage (if you have one that is).
From a space point of view only the trailer tent compares to a tent in terms of space. It's true that you can add an awning to a caravan or camper van to increase the space you have but that's just a tent on the side and to me says 'look the basic unit isn't big enough you need this extra space too'. The problem with awnings is they are an add-on, an after thought. You can't sit in a caravan and chat to someone in the awning they are different spaces and the same is true I think for a camper van awning. So despite having a similar footprint to a large tent, a caravan or camper van with an awning doesn't give the same large integrated space you get in a large tent. Also caravan awnings are nowhere near as comfortable as a modern tent, no SIG means that as a space to sleep in for example they area lot worse than a modern tent.
So caravans and camper vans don't compare on space. Trailer tents on the other hand compare quite favourably they create a large space with integrated sleeping and living areas, seating and storage. The Trigano range is a great example. They also have that sleeping off the ground aspect covered.
This got me thinking. We have a tunnel tent with a living area at the front and 2 bedrooms at the rear. How hard would it be to lift the bedrooms 60cm or so off the ground, give them a solid floor that could perhaps convert to a sofa. Surely that's not too hard to do, it could be an add on to a standard tent as bedrooms area pretty standard design across multiple tents within a range.
I know we'd buy a couple of 'raised floor bedrooms' even at say £100+ each as that's a lot less than the thousands we'd have to shell out for a trailer tent.
Come on Outwell make a raised floor bedroom, you know it makes sense.