Four nights on the west coast in July, and I already carry poles. Tarp plus bug inner is 640g and packs tiny, the freestanding tent is 1080g and pitches on rock or boardwalk. Saving 440g matters to me but so does being able to pitch where pegs won't hold, and midges make a sealed inner non-negotiable.
The freestanding argument only wins if you actually camp on surfaces that won't take pegs. Four nights on the west coast isn't that. Alpine rock ledges would be the other way round.
Midge-specific: check the mesh spec on your inner. Proper no-see-um mesh stops them, ordinary mosquito netting doesn't, and highland midges will find any gap where the mesh meets the groundsheet. That matters far more than which shelter type you pick.
This. I've spent a night in a beautifully pitched tarp being eaten through something the label called insect netting.
Whichever you take, bring a head net. It weighs 20g and it's the difference between cooking dinner and not cooking dinner in July on that coast.
@packlist_pen · 7mo ago · 3 replies
Take the tarp and inner, with caveats.
Midges make the inner mandatory and you already have one, so the real question is pitching. On the west coast you will nearly always find peggable ground. It's boggy rather than rocky, and the problem is pegs pulling out of soft ground rather than not going in. Carry six proper Y-stakes instead of the wire ones in the box and you're fine.
The 440g isn't the main advantage anyway. The main advantage is that a pole shelter pitches taut in wind once you know how, and packs away wet without contaminating the inside of your pack.
Caveat: practise the pitch in the garden at least three times, once in the dark. Pitching a pole shelter badly in wind at 10pm surrounded by midges is genuinely miserable and it's the failure mode nobody budgets for.
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@dart_doctor · 7mo ago
Once in the dark is a good specific instruction. Doing that this weekend.
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@onebag_ozzy · 7mo ago
And once in wind if you can arrange it. Wind is what separates a pole shelter that's fine from one that flaps all night.
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