I am going to buy a tent just as soon as i sell a few guns. The question i have is about using canvas. I have looked at cabelas and they have a good looking tent not made of canvas called the EXT in a dome style. WE are not sure of the real size of it, ie: after 5 days is it really a 6 person tent. My brothers and i are looking at canvas because we can put a small wood stove inside and dry our stuff or just plain be comfortable. We are all in our late thirties and are starting to feel it. Thus, the thought of cots is appealing.
Packing a tent around will not be a problem because we have planes,boats and 6 wheelers. Is canvas a good material to use or is it a bigger pain that is worth? There is a tent in fairbanks we looked at also, cant remember the name but i have a brochure sent to me by a nice fellow from up there. The stove thing just sounds good to us.

greg p:
You do not want canvas - period! The tent you're looking for is the Arctic Oven made by Alaska Tent & Tarp here in Fbks. I'll tell you now that they cost more but if you get stuck in bad weather you'll be very glad you had one. As I recall, they have 2 sizes of umbrella (8'x8' and 10'x10') as well as some type of smaller backpacker size. Not sure of the backpacker size, I only vaguely remember some info on it. For 2 guys in bad weather, you'll want the 10x10 with a small wood stove. 2 cots easily fit inside, put the cots on pieces of scrap carpet to protect the floor. I bought one last summer for our Afognak Island elk hunt and was I ever glad I had it. Previously, we had rented a canvas wall tent with a wood stove & froze our asses. On this last hunt, we had wind up to about 40 mph along with rain. We were toasty warm & dry. The standard 10x10 weighs about 56 lbs. as I recall & comes with all poles & stuff bags. A lot better than canvas any day of the week and NO, I have no financial interest in the company. Spend the money & get good, reliable equipment, you life could depend on it. Bear in Fairbanks

I will second the Arctic Oven. I picked up a A.O. 10
this winter for a trip to Kodiak http://www.alaskatent.com/

Bear already knows that I don't disagree with him, so I will tell you about what tents I have used in the interior of Alaska: I have used Cabela's Geodesic 4 and 2-man tents. These tents will stand the winds around Chitina, and anywhere in the interior, but like other geodesic tents, there is no room inside to stand or walk around. Not so, however, with the very expensive geodesic "Alaskan Guide Model," specially the 8-man and 6-man ones.



A bear destroyed one of my Geodesic Backpack tents a few years ago, so I bought a used 9'x10' canvas tent, and have been using it since. This canvas tent has an interior ridge pole, which is held up by two extendible aluminum poles. Then is has two exterior poles along the two walls, held in place (each) by two extendible aluminum poles. It has a bug screen door, a couple of windows, and a canvas floor. I heat the tent only when needed, with a Mr. Buddy capitalistic propane heater that has an oxygen sensor/fuel shutoff system.



My hunting partners use the same type of tents. This year I bought a 8'x10' Wall tent from Big Ray's, and paid $225.00 (on sale). It's made of 10 Wt. canvas, but it's not treated. It has no floor, no frame, and no bug screen. These tents are designed so you can use timber to hold it up. A ridge pole can be passed through two holes, one at each end of the ridge, and these poles are supported by two timber A-Frames (one at each end). I plan to work on this tent during the summer, and will have it ready for hunting by next year. I will sew-in a screen door, and will line the bottom edges with a strip of Velcro. I will sew a canvas floor to fit, and sew to this floor a strip of Velcro all the way around. I will also build a frame for it, made of 1/2" electrical conduit. The pieces of conduit will be connected to a series of frame angles made of a larger diameter conduit. Each ridge end will have one of these angles, then each corner.



To erect this tent I will stretch the floor, put the frame assembly together (on the floor), cover the now standing frame with the tent, and finally, attach the tent's wall bottom to the floor with the Velcro. After that, I tie nylon rope to the built-in grommets on the exterior of the tent, and to the trees nearby. The tent will sit under a large A-Frame structure (the same one I use with my current tent), and over the A-Frame I will stretch a large tarpaulin to keep things dry underneath.



That's what I do each year. You won't believe how comfortable canvas tents can be unless you try one

Has anybody looked at Cabelas EXT tents????