One of the minor events of our camping trip was discovering that one of the pole sections had split. This isn’t uncommon with fibreglass poles. They bend and flex with the wind, which is generally a good thing, but sometimes they get strained too far. Fortunately, it was a minor break and a few bits of masking tape was sufficient to jury rig a repair but we knew that one of our tasks on getting home would be to do something more permanent.

Consequently, I have discovered two things. Firstly, there are fewer options than I expected for purchasing spares. Have we become a culture that would rather throw away a tent after a small breakage, or just because it is more than a season or two old, than make do and mend? Secondly, it really is quite a simple repair. It turned out that we didn’t even have to replace the elasticated ‘shock cord’ that runs down the centre of each set of poles although it was helpful having a clip to stop the elastic pulling it back down the other poles.

That is the repair done and the tent is ready for another outing although that probably won’t be until next year now.