STAYING DOWN TO EARTH
Kerstin Langenberger, who has spent much of her adult life in Iceland, recalls one of her windiest wild camps – and explains why she came to totally trust Hilleberg tents
IT IS SURPRISINGLY EASY to underestimate the importance of a tent. On my second multi-day hike ever, pretty much all my outdoor equipment was borrowed, old or improvised. Together with a friend, I was on a five-day trek in the interior of Iceland. It was a beautifully sunny summer’s day, but quite windy, as it is so very often in the Arctic. We pitched our cheap no-name tent underneath a bluff, totally ignorant to the idea that, although steep cliffs can protect you from the wind, they also can produce powerful turbulences.
And sure enough: whilst we were unpacking our well-used gear outside in the sunshine, a sudden gust hit. The nearly empty tent with its open door acted like a huge sail. With an exploding sound, the small pegs were torn out of the sandy ground and our home for the night lifted 15 metres into the air. I can still see it in my mind’s eye: the airborne tent flying up and away into the azureblue sky, with its open-door sheets flapping like green wings.
I dashed after it as fast as possible, trying to catch it, but to no avail. The tent crashed into a rock and rolled several times over the coarse lava landscape before it came to a halt. The outer fabric was torn and one of the two poles broken: it was the end of our camping trip.
In the following years, I worked on Iceland’s most popular long-distance hiking trail, Laugavegur. I cannot recall how many broken tent poles and ripped hulls I’ve observed. But never ever have I seen a Hilleberg tent give in to an Icelandic storm!
My first choice of shelter was therefore a Hilleberg Nammatj 2: a light yet very spacious tunnel tent, which is extremely durable and really good in high winds. When Covid had just hit in 2020,
I decided to take ‘social distancing’ seriously and set off on a 17-day solo skiing expedition through Iceland. One windy afternoon I was engulfed by white-out, and within an incredibly short amount of time the gusts were so strong I could hardly stand upright any more. This was far windier than the weather forecast had predicted!
In order to avoid another episode of ‘flying tent’, I tied a short string to one peg attachment when I was first pitching the tent, which I connected to a ski stuck into the snow. With the tent secured upwind, I was able to pitch it, alone, even in those galeforce winds. Once inside my precious home-away-from-home, I could warm up, make myself dinner – and relax. The wind was battering the tent so violently that I would have feared broken poles or ripped fabric, had I not learned by now to totally trust the robustness of Black Label Hilleberg tents.
My biggest worry during winter camping is snow accumulation on the tent, which is why I usually stick my head out every few hours, ready to shovel some snow or build a snow-block wall for protection. That night, though, with a comfortable feeling of safety, I decided to just wait it out. The next morning came and the winds and snow drift continued, but the visibility improved. Relatively well-rested, warm and happy, I packed my sled and took down my Nammatj.
Once again it had proven itself a worthy expedition tent: it passed the battering of snow-laden gale-force winds with flying colours and enabled me to continue my wonderful solo adventure through my beloved Arctic winter wonderland.