Tent advice

[Tonchi]

If you are not planning to make a career out of camping, just about anything which will cover you for a few months will do fine, and the prices are really great at Walmart, Big 5, Sports Authority, just about everywhere really. Unless you will be camping in really severe climate conditions, you do not really need to keep out much more than mosquitos. Then buy another tent next summer if you are inclined to do the camping scene again.

BTW, seriously heed the advice about the groundcloth, it will avoid unpleasant surprises at times when the weather is not conducive to getting outside and digging a trench to get the water out of the spot you pitched the tent on

As for the styles of tents, from my experiences as a car camper I would suggest avoiding the kind with the frame outside of the fabric. It gives you a saggy tent. Also look for one with a flap or bill that suspends over the top (assuming you get a pitched-roof style instead of a pavillion), it acts as insulation from the sun's heat and rain deflector. I got mine at REI in Berkeley many years ago, they have a website now. I paid too much, though. But in those days there was a viable US economy not based on importation of shabby sporting goods from China.

P.S. Something else just occurred to me: Don't leave ANYTHING you would be putting in your mouth in the tent at night (and no wisecracks are necessary, OK?). I mean that I found out the hard way that bears like TOOTHPASTE just fine. It's not just what you pack in the cooler that they go after. Better safe than sorry, you do not want an 800-pound rug coming throught the wall of your pretty new tent because you did not think ahead