which tent dome or tunnel

[Jenna]

on loose ground you need to swap from pegs to some form of anchor, as Chris has said you can use carrier bags etc or buy snow anchors... anything that is at the end of the day a weight.

snow/sand anchors in the good camping stores are dirt cheap (under £10 for 4) and are like a mini parachutes that you fill with snow, sand, stones, rocks etc.

[tpcornet12]

I would recommend a dome tent but be careful not to go too cheap.

Generally I have found that the more crossovers the poles make, the more sturdy it will be in high wind. Standard dome tents only cross once but better ones can have the porch form part of the main structure too and crossover the 2 main poles - this makes it much stronger.

[moonshine]

Hi,
we went from a frame tent ,5 berth ,to a dome ,4 berth for reasons of weight of canvass etc,this had no built in groundsheet and was more than a little bit draughty,you can only stand up in the middle due to the dome and also found that when on a stand the cooker had to be well away from the walls due to the curvature, so then came the tunnel,complete with built in ground sheet,less curvature on the walls and lots of room, its a biggy like us,.Both tunnel and dome take around similar times to put up,although we are not too sure as whenever we put up the tunnel it arises interest in both campers and caravaners and being an amiable sort that usually adds an hour on chatting. Both definatly need 2 people to erect and on occasions a reasonable command of an anglo saxon vocabulary.The secret if there is one to putting up any tent is experience born out of practice,the more you put them up the easier it becomes .We did have one slight concern with the tunnel ,even when we thought we had done things right,the tunnel is fairly taurght when pegged out longtitudenally but not quite so good laterally,my good women was cooking on the cooker mounted on a cooker stand at what we thought was a safe distance from the wall in squally weather when a sudden burst of wind smacked the side of the tunnel and it came in on the cooker and shot the mixed grill she was preparing off the cooker towards her and on the floor,she was shook up and the sausages,chops etc a bit dusty.
the solution ,we brought a camping gas oven and grill ,which is heavier and also sits on a stand a lot lower than previous giving us a bit more weight with a lot lower centre of gravity,more stability and confidence.
Regarding the electric hook up,I sucombed to her wishes ,got one with the circit breaker as stated in your correspondance, installed electric lights instead of gas with the addition of remote controls for the power,so, when we get to bed no turning off the gas and fiddling with torches ,just flick the button and off they go .Being off a certain age we need to get up in the night ,the lights come on easily.
All sounds a bit noncy,we are in our mid sixties,thouroughly enjoy camping and if we can make it easier for ourselves why not,and we seem to have a lot more usable space at our disposal than a lot of caravans and will only camp where there is a shower available,granted it takes a while to set up camp the way we like it,but like it we do.