Besides being quite expensive, I now also owe a couple of friends a lot of beer for initially helping carry it up to our 3rd floor flat, and then bursting several foo-foo valves carrying it back down again to install on the car a couple of months later.  (A foo-foo valve is the organ a weightlifter is trying to protect when he wears a large belt.  It is connected to various other organs in the body and when strained causes the weightlifter to release his / her bladder and in extreme cases his /her bowels.)

Having installed the tent we headed out to a camp site 20 minutes away to try it out for a weekend.  Pitching it and putting it away again was simple and painless, and at some stage I’m sure there will be a time trial.  It was quite comfortable to sleep in, and I’m really looking forward to the excitement of waking up to animals below us.

We were also the talk of the camp site and having parked in the middle of a herd of camper vans  we had more pensioners than you can shake a walking stick at coming along to have a chat about the tent.

In a campsite full of OAPs my bladder felt like it wasn’t working hard enough and pleasant dreams soon turned into nightmares about spending a penny at 2 in the morning.  With scary things like shongololos (millipedes) and spiders down below, late night bathroom breaks are an issue we will have to resolve somehow and unfortunately I don’t think there is an elegant solution.  Any ideas are welcome!

For the roof tent spotters among you it’s an Eezi-Awn.  We’ve done loads of research, and if you’re in the market for a roof tent, our advice would be to stay away from cheaper tents and stick to more established brands, even if you go for a second hand one like we did.  Hannibal and Howling Moon appear to be other really good alternatives.