I haven’t done any proper hiking for almost a year. No ski tour in the spring, no summer hiking holiday with the family… and an autumn hike in the Swedish fells, like what I’ve done the past few years, is not going to happen either. Staying in small huts, cheek by jowl with strangers (and new strangers every night) does not sound like a good idea at all in the current coronavirus circumstances.

I guess I’ll have to figure out some other kind of hiking this year, without any huts and such. And for that I’ll need a tent. We have a tent but it’s a stonking big four-season tent for three people – robust, but weighs a ton, and there is no way I’ll be lugging it around on a solo hike.

I cycled to the city today (which felt just like the old days) and went shopping for something more suitable: a three-season one-person tent. I looked at a few and even put up two of them on the shop floor. They had a special area for that, which I hadn’t expected but it does rather make sense. Tents are expensive and you don’t want to buy a pig in a poke.

Well, I tried putting up two of them. With one of them my efforts failed, and so did the shop assistant’s, even after watching an instruction video. It was an easy decision at that point to give up on that tent and buy the other one – Hilleberg’s Enan – which had a very clear instruction manual and was very easy to figure out. And made in Estonia, as a bonus.

It also happened to be the most expensive tent I looked at. It wasn’t my plan, but it also wasn’t a surprise. Cost and quality don’t always go strictly hand in hand, but when it comes to camping equipment, there is a strong relationship. The tent we have already is also a Hilleberg. We’ve had it for a long time and it’s still going strong. With care and repairs, I expect the new tent to last the rest of my hiking years.