Thank you Eureka
for providing me with products to review, free of charge.
These are my own honest opinions.

As a child, we used to go camping a few weeks every summer. I have very fond memories of that time and I was eager to continue the tradition with our daughter. However, we only had a small 2-person tent that we barely large enough for my husband and I and our backpacks so there was no way the two of us, our daughter, and the unfathomable amount of stuff you need for a little one when you’re away for a few days would fit. We were ready for an major upgrade and we got it thanks to Eureka!

Eureka is a Canadian company that develops and offers a wide selection of camping gear especially designed for the Canadian climate and environment. Their products are well-known for their quality and they are made to last even when used in rugged conditions. They also make military tents and party and event tents. Around here, you can see their products everywhere: a backpack at the park, a tent at the campground, a folding chair at the beach, etc.

For this review, I received the beautiful Tundern Cove 6 with the Pinery 500 Footprint.

The Tundern Cove 6 tent is a brand new tent from Eureka and it comes in a unique golden color. It is designed to accommodate a family of 4-5 people with room to spare or 6 people in mummy-type sleeping bags. We use an inflatable double mattress and a smaller 1-place kid mattress for my daughter but I’m sure we could have fitted 2 double mattresses. As you can see, it’s a very roomy tent measuring 8 feet by 11 feet. The tent roof is 6 feet high at the highest point in the middle of the tent. It was quite nice to be able to stand up in the tent, rather than having to half-crawl, half-kneel my way around. I was also surprised by how light it is compared to other tents of a similar size: thanks to the aluminum poles and light fabric, it weights only 19lbs 6oz. It’s not designed as a tent to take hiking but it’s still just a few pounds more than my much smaller and older tent.

It comes with a full coverage fly sheet which means it can be used during 3 seasons or all year round if you don’t live in a area with cold winters. The fly sheet creates 2 vestibules, a large one for the front door and a smaller one for the back door. The center portion of the front vestibule can be lifted up and the back vestibule can be opened as well. There are 2 doors, on opposite sides of the tent, hence the 2 vestibules. There are also 2 long and narrow mesh windows on either side of the tent. The two-door design allows the breeze to blow through the tent which really helps with ventilation and to keep the temperature down during hot summer days, especially because the doors are really wide. I also like that both the front and back doors open in 2 sections and you can have taffeta fabric zipped up on both sides or only on one side of each door depending on the conditions and the privacy that you want.

This is my first tent with vestibules and I have to say it’s my favorite features of the tent. It allowed us to store a lot of stuff that would otherwise clutter the inside of the tent. We had my daughter’s toys, our sports equipment and cooking gear, as well as a container with some food (no worries, we were in a campground with no wild animals around) all under the vestibule with room to spare. The front vestibule would be large enough to fit 2 folding chairs if you wanted to sit in the shade or needed shelter from the rain.

Speaking of storage, the Tundern Cove 6 comes with 4 mesh storage pockets, one on each inside wall of the tent as well as 4 storage pockets on the outside of the tent (2 on the front and 2 on the back of the tent). There is also a mesh loft storage that you can install along the roof of the tent. We used the mesh pockets for our glasses and flashlight at night and the vestibule pockets for easy access to sunscreen, sun hats, small toys, and other miscellaneous items. It was really convenient and even my daughter could reach in them for her toys.

The set up of the tent was very straight forward: 2 aluminum poles that you slide in the pole sleeves to form an X, you then stake the tent in place, place the fly sheet over the tent and slide one more pole for the large front vestibule. There are Velcro loops and clips to hold the tent and the fly sheet in place as well as reinforced guy line loops and guy lines to ensure maximum stability in windy conditions. There are stakes for each corner of the tent and 10 additional ones for the vestibules and guy lines. 2 people can easily install it. We didn’t even need to look at the instructions to set it up. I also want to point out that the tent, fly sheet, and poles easily fit back in their packing bag when we were done. It might not seem like a big deal but with our previous tent, it was like trying to fit an elephant in a backpack… no matter how we tried to fold it, it wouldn’t fit unless we pushed and pulled on the zippers so I thought it was worth mentioning that you won’t run into this problem with a Eureka tent.

The only thing to remember is that the front vestibule on the fly tent is identified with yellow webbing. You need to know which one it is so you can make sure the large vestibule will be facing the way you want. You also need to know which door on the tent is meant to be the front. As far as I can tell, the only way to know this is to look at the corner pins. The side with the front door will have 2 sets of pins in each corner (one for the tent pole, one for the vestibule post). The first time we set it up, we didn’t realize the front vestibule could only be installed one way  and ended up with it at the back of the tent. It didn’t take long to rotate the tent so it would face in the right direction but the next time we knew to look for the side with extra pins to know where the front vestibule needs to go.

With our tent, we also received the Pinery 500 Footprint which is a large piece of coated nylon fabric designed to fit the size of the tent and vestibules. You place it under the tent to protect its floor against sharp rocks, dampness, etc. Because it’s the same size as the tent and fly, it is simply secured with loops and hooks to the stakes you use when you set up the tent.

The first time we set up the tent, we didn’t use the Footprint because we were on an even grassy area and the weather was supposed to be nice for the weekend (and I’ll admit we were too excited to set up the tent for the first time!) Of course, we ended up having a big downpour on the second night and I wished we’d set it up, not because the tent floor became wet (it actually stayed perfectly dry even though it rained for 6-8 hours) but because it would have been nice for the vestibule areas. The grass under the vestibules became wet because the ground all around the tent was soaked and soggy. Fortunately, the vestibules did deflect the rain away from the tent so that helped.

I learned 2 lessons from this: 1. always set the Footprint, no matter what the forecast says, 2. Eureka tents are really waterproof from roof to floor! It was amazing to hear the rain fall while we remained cozy and dry in the tent. Because the fly doesn’t touch the tent walls and goes all the way down to the ground, we didn’t get any condensation or trickles on the walls. When the rain calmed down, I went to look at the fly and I could see how the rain drops were beading and rolling off of it leaving the fly virtually dry. Since all major seams are factory taped, the rain couldn’t even seep through them.

In case my review isn’t eloquent enough, I want to say that I am extremely pleased with our Eureka Tundern Cove 6 tent and Pinery 500 Footprint. They are very well designed with thoughtful details such as the mesh pockets and extra large double doors and made of durable, high-quality waterproof materials. I am glad that we found a large tent with a very useful vestibule area for storage which is easy to set up and can accommodate our growing family. We’ll be able to use our new tent for years to come and I can’t wait for my daughter to create memories around our camping trips!

Buy It: Head over to Eureka to see for yourself the great selection of tents and outdoors gear they offer.

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Rachel