I lived in a surreal limbo, knowing that I had been capable of more and struggling to reconcile that my brain was … hurt and needed rest. I was scared that I would never be the same, that I would never have the same capacity to achieve intellectual or physical accomplishments like I had previously. The Pacific Breeze Easy Up and the Qipi Beach Cabana came in just behind the top scorers. This position is primarily due to their larger packed sizes, which makes them slightly more difficult to carry and store. The Qipi, in particular, has a much longer packed size and, at nearly 10 pounds, it’s heavier than the others mentioned above. The Easy Up may have been the lightest in our list of top scorers, but it also comes in a longer packed size, which affected its overall score.
However, fitting it into a compact car may still be a challenge. The price tag may also be too high for some shoppers, but we feel the quality increase is worth it if you can swing it. During the winter and early spring of 2017, we added four more canopy tents to our testing lineup.
As the sun sets we crawl inside our tent, do our final tick check, and fall asleep quite easily to the sound of whippoorwills and owls filling the night air. The house itself has enough room for several people to live comfortably. There is a natural spring behind the house a ways, with clear, cool water gushing out from between two rocks. We spend time exploring inside and then we make our way up to the roof/ rock ledge.
Compared with our top day-tent pick, the L.L.Bean Woodlands Screen House uses arguably superior materials; it also comes with an unsurpassed warranty. But with a ceiling that’s 6 inches lower, it feels smaller and darker. It always cost more than our top pick, but the price has gone up another $150 since we first tested it.
The L.L.Bean Woodlands Screen House has a much more consistently glowing history of online reviews than does the REI tent. While the previous version of this tent used beachy-feeling aqua and orange, the current version is a drab olive green more typical of other tents. This doesn’t affect the functionality, but the brighter colors were ozark trail chair something we previously praised. We set up the REI Screen House Shelter and L.L.Bean’s Woodlands Screen House side by side in the Mojave Desert in 100-degree temps. Fellow campers consistently gravitated toward the REI shelter over the L.L.Bean. There’s a reason why makers of professional-grade canopies only use straight-leg frames.
It is created by a stream flowing over the edge of a rock cliff. There is only 4-5 feet from the top of the ledge to the earth below, where the water keeps flowing down the hill. It feels like winter was still holding on, not ready to let go just yet. We both stay bundled up as this side of the mountain is in the shade.
This shelter employs high-grade, collapsible aluminum poles for its frame and comes complete with built-in guy lines and sandbags to help keep it sturdy. The polyester canopy effectively dampens the sun’s rays and is double-stitched and weather-taped to keep out the rain. The Clam Quick-Set Escape was by far the toughest canopy tent we tested. It’s made with reinforced polyester and heavyweight no-see-um mesh, and it comes with the strongest stakes we’ve seen on any tent. The Clam also sets up and folds down with remarkable speed—we timed the process at 60 seconds.