Waking up in your tent should be a refreshing and pleasant experience. Even if it's raining out, the smell of fresh rain, the sound of raindrops against the roof of your tent are nice reminders of a wonderful night spent in the outdoors. But, waking up in a wet tent is not that nice. Especially if your gear, clothes and sleeping bag are wet too.
In order to prevent moisture build up inside your tent, follow these simple instructions for a fresh smelling and moisture free tent.
1. Ventilation is key. Our bodies give off moisture during the night or anytime we are spending time inside our tents. That moisture needs to escape or it will become trapped inside with us and our gear. If it is warm enough outside at night, leave a small opening along the side or top "windows". This is where choosing a great tent will come in very handy. A great tent will often come with two doors and side wall mesh vents or windows or both if you're lucky.
Our family sized camping tent comes will all these options and what we do at night is to make sure the vents are open from the outside. These are small mesh windows that we keep open with the velcro strap that comes with the tent itself. They are located near the top of the tent and allow any warm or moist air to escape the tent which is especially important at night.
If your tent does not come with little vents that you can access from the outside you can also use your zippered side vents. Simply opening them slightly as close to the top as possible will also allow moist air to escape and fresh air to come in.
2. During the day it's a good idea to keep the air in your tent fresh and dry. Because cooler air will enter your tent from lower down and warmer, moist air needs to escape from a higher point, try allowing a small opening near the bottom of the doors of your tent to allow cooler air to enter and using vents and windows that are slightly open near the top of your tent will allow that warmer and moist air to escape. This kind of air flow will allow fresh air to fill your tent by day and ensure a drier tent when you need it at night for sleeping.
3. Keep all your gear away from the inside walls of your tent. This is really important because any gear including your sleeping bag will become moist if it's allowed to touch the inside walls of your tent. If you move a lot during the night and your feet are against the wall of your tent than simply place a garbage bag around the outside of your feet to keep your sleeping bag from getting wet.
If you follow this simple advice for reducing the condensation inside your tent you and your gear will stay much drier.
Happy Camping!