Motorcycle camping is something that I have enjoyed, however, now that I have a piece of steel that sticks out of my leg very close to my knee, I can no longer kneel down. It appears that a new tent that can accommodate me walking in and out, instead of crawling in and out, may be necessary. Therefore I’m looking for a new tent that can accommodate my needs, yet is light enough to carry on my sports tourer without becoming a pain in the knee, so to speak.
I started by looking specifically at motorcycle tents, like the Lone Rider, which allows one to bring their bike inside the tent’s vestibule. They sounded like a great idea, the only problem being the size of the tent itself, which I would call, large. I’m not overly worried about anyone rolling my bike away, as I place a lock on both the brake handle and the brake disc so that the bike cannot roll. When combined with my GPS tracker, that alone would require a thief to disassemble the bike to find it.
So my dilemma is simple. Find a tent that has enough height to be able to get into it without getting on my knees, while at the same time being light enough, and small enough to not be an inconvenience to set up and take down. Oftentimes, where I will want to place a tent at altitude there are few flat, earthen locations to be found.
There are some great tents on the market, however for the price of some I might as well stay at motels. Having said that, I have found one in particular that seems suitable. I’m not quite 5’10”, so a tent that has a height where I can walk in the tent, without having to get on my knees, for me that’s doable. The Core 4-person tent meets all of the criteria that I’ve laid out and costs just $325 CDN.
I also wanted a tent that either has a vestibule, where I can keep my riding gear, or one large enough where I can fit a cot and my gear without being left to the elements. The tent (above) that I have in mind enables that as well. It also has two entrances and weighs just 12 pounds, which isn’t bad for a four-season tent. The bagged tent can be easily placed in two dry bags, less than 21 inches wide, so fitting it on my rear seat should be quite easy on the Ninja 1000sx.
If any of you have had experience with the tent I’d appreciate you dropping me a line or making a comment. I’ve looked at writeups for the product and they’ve been quite favorable, rated #1 for a four-person walk-in style tent in 2024.
Ciao…
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