Hywel Davies wrote:
> You could also consider a goretex bivi-bag. The hooped variety (perhaps a
> bit more than a hundred) are pretty well as comfy as a tent, very light, and
> very very easy to put up. The only snag is there's no room for any stuff,
> which has to be left outside. I use mine a lot for one-night dosses. The
> basic bivis are lighter still, but obviously more claustraphopic - I'd
> rather carry the hoop !
Quite the opposite. I have a goretex bivvy bag, and it's tremendously
liberating compared to my tent. Instead of being cooped up in a
confined space, my tent is the sky!
In serious rain, it's less than ideal: I tend to turn it upside down so
I can have a downward-facing (and small) opening to breathe through.
But it's got me through "interesting times", like a night on the
snowfield on the Switzerland/Italy border when the weather turned nasty
(the newspapers reported a dozen deaths in the mountains that night).
And in midgy conditions it's less than ideal. But then so is a tent:
midgy conditions are when you're in need of every last breath of breeze,
and can't close yourself off from them.
There are conditions where the tent is preferable. But it's a very
short list.
--
Nick Kew