For our Appalachian Trail thru-hike, we carried the Kelty TN 2 Person Tent
, and it served us well.
We upgraded from a small Coleman backpacking tent, which worked for a while, but after spending a night in a rainstorm and waking up with the floor of our tent soaked, we decided it was time for an upgrade.
The TN2 comes in at about 4.5 lbs packed. There are lighter options out there, but for a little over 2 lbs per person, it’s a good value. It also packs up to a pretty small size when using the provided “stuff sack”. It packs up even smaller when using a compression sack. For us, it took up about as much space as a Nalgene bottle.
The best parts of this tent are the head room, the steep sides, and the vestibules. There are two entrances on this tent. With the rain fly on, there’s a vestibule on each side of the tent, so each person has their own covered space to keep their pack/boots. We also really enjoyed the stargazer feature, which let us roll back the rainfly and sleep under the stars while still being protected from bugs.
As for setup, it’s pretty simple. Color coded poles and buckles make for a simple setup. There’s only two parts to set up, so it goes up quickly. By the end of our thru-hike we could be set up in less than 5 minutes.
The only complaint we have is that there’s no stakes/line included for the sides of the rain-fly. There are loops in the rain-fly, and there are guy-lines for the four corners, but the edges don’t come with any additional lines. This is a pretty easy fix, though, with some additional cord and a few stakes.
We definitely recommend this tent for any couples who are regular backpackers. While not the lightest backpacking tent on the market, at under $170 on Amazon (as of this review) it’s a great value.
