Swiss Gear Mon­treaux Ten Per­son Fam­ily Dome Tent Review

 

 

Just returned from a three day camp­ing trip and had the oppor­tu­nity to stay in a Swiss Gear Mon­treaux Ten Per­son Fam­ily Dome Tent. It was a good expe­ri­ence. The assem­bly was quite sim­ple. Swiss Gear says two peo­ple are required but I believe one could do it. The corded poles are part of what makes it so easy. It shouldn’t take more than 20–25 min­utes to set up. The rain fly is the only part that may require a sec­ond per­son.
• Base: 17.5 ft. x 14 ft.
• Cen­ter Height: 84 in.
• Area: 177 sq. ft.
• Weight: 37 lbs.

Mon­treaxu’ Space

The Mon­treaux is a very spa­cious tent. It is made to sleep up to ten peo­ple. We only slept five but we had room for stor­age plus extra space. The tent can be divided into two rooms to pro­vide pri­vacy or to use as a liv­ing area. The divider is eas­ily posi­tioned out of the way when needed. The height is nice. I was able to stand in most of the tent with­out slouch­ing which is uncom­mon in a dome tent. The two smaller side rooms are a bit shorter though.

Swiss Gear Mon­treaux Weather

The Swiss Gear is sup­posed to be a good weather resis­tant tent. We only had a light sprin­kle but we stayed dry. The rain fly is big enough to do its job. The tent is coated with a water repel­lent. The floor is also water resis­tant but you should use an under tarp any­way. The mesh roof is nice for air flow and star gaz­ing with­out the bugs eat­ing you up. The win­dows are large enough to get good air cir­cu­la­tion or to help you keep an eye on the out­side world.

There are plenty of slots and pock­ets for stor­ing your items out of the way. The two side rooms are good for extra stor­age. The stakes could be bet­ter but that is the same with all tents these days. Over­all the Swiss Gear Mon­treaux  is a good tent that can be had for a good price.. It is cur­rently 40% off with free ship­ping at Ama­zon. Click to check Amazon.

Colum­bia Cougar Flats II Fam­ily Cabin Dome Tent

10 Per­son Tent

 

 

Size of Colum­bia Cougar Flats II

Mea­sur­ing 15 feet by 10 feet and over seven feet tall the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II Fam­ily Cabin Dome Tent has a vast cav­ernous inte­rior which is divid­able into two rooms so you can put those kids in a sep­a­rate room. Or you could use one room as a bed­room and the other like a liv­ing room. If you pre­fer you can zip up the room divider and just have one big room. The Colum­bia Cougar Flats eas­ily sleeps six peo­ple, and we even manged to squeeze in ten peo­ple one time though it was a lit­tle tight. This may be my favorite 10 per­son tent avail­able at the moment.  Some­one actu­ally fit an extra large cot, a nor­mal cot and two twin air mat­tresses inside of the Colum­bia Cougar Flats with some space remain­ing on the edges. With two entrance doors access to the tent should never get jammed. Also on the rain fly is an awning that is big enough to cover two or three seats. Weigh­ing in at 54 pounds this is not a tent for hik­ing. But the tote bag has wheels and this helps a lot with trans­port­ing the tent. In the Colom­bia Cougar space should never be an issue.

Cougar Flats Dimensions:

Width: 15 feet by 10

Height: over 7 feet

Set Up

The Colum­bia Cougar Flats goes up rather eas­ily. The poles are color coded which makes things pretty easy yo fig­ure out. The instruc­tion man­ual is a lit­tle vague so the first setup took a lit­tle longer than the sec­ond. The first time took us 35 min­utes. The sec­ond only about 20 min­utes. It is pos­si­ble to setup with one per­son but 2 makes the process much eas­ier. Chances are if you are buy­ing a tent this big you will have some­one to help you. Tak­ing the tent down is a rather quick process. I found that it is very easy to col­lapse. Also the EZ Pak that comes with the tent is expand­able so no more strug­gling to stuff your tent back into the bag. This is actu­ally one of my favorite fea­tures of the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II.

Weather Resis­tance of Colum­bia Cougar flats

The Colum­bia Cougar Flats II is equipped with a rain­fly that has an 800 mm coat­ing, and although I’d usu­ally rec­om­mend an 1000mm coat­ing the Cougar held up just fine in stormy weather. The seams of the Cougar are fac­tory sealed but it is rec­om­mended that you use the Kenyon 3 sealer that comes with the tent as extra pre­cau­tion. We camped in the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II dur­ing mild storms with­out a leak or pud­dle. Although we did use a tarp under­neath the tent, which is always rec­om­mended. The Bay win­dow design allows you to keep your win­dows open dur­ing stormy weather. The Cyclone vent­ing sys­tem allows for greater air cir­cu­la­tion inside the tent allow­ing you to beat the heat. The roof is ven­ti­lated and has much mesh , so with the rain­fly removed you can get even bet­ter air flow and free light pro­vided by the sun. When we took our Colum­bia Cougar Flats II camp­ing on the beach it held up to the con­stant winds with­out a prob­lem. The upper poles being made of fiber­glass and the bot­tom ones of metal make for a sturdy hybrid pole system.

Addi­tional Features

The inte­rior of the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II includes sev­eral fea­tures to aide in orga­ni­za­tion. A loft for hid­ing gear and other items out of your way. I found the loft to be not only cool but also a handy fea­ture on this10 per­son  fam­ily tent. There are also stor­age lock­ers for plac­ing items in. The hang­ing cup hold­ers are a fea­ture that I truly love. Sev­eral inter­nal pock­ets are also located within the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II. This is one of the bet­ter orga­ni­za­tion aid­ing tents out there. There is also a Camp port for any cables that need to pass through the tent.

Colum­bia Cougar Flats Cons

There are only two cons I have found with the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II. The first is that both exter­nal doors enter the same room. This is only a con in some sit­u­a­tions. With small chil­dren this would be con­sid­ered a bonus. The sec­ond poten­tial neg­a­tive is that the place­ment of the awning isn’t over one of the two doors. But at least it has an awning.

Sum­mary

In sum­mary the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II is a great tent. In fact it is my favorite at the moment( I think its the hang­ing cup hold­ers). With its large size, good weather resis­tance, and great orga­ni­za­tional fea­tures camp­ing this sum­mer should be a breeze. Colum­bia has really out­done them­selves this time with another high qual­ity fam­ily size camp­ing tent.  This 10 per­son tent usu­ally ships with free ship­ping. Click Here to see if there is still an 18% dis­count on the Colum­bia Cougar Flats II Fam­ily Cabin Dome Tent.