As my friends and I get older, our annual camping trip has progressed from 2 man tents, ground mats and a tin of beans to a miniature village with all the latest camping gadgets and creature comforts. The Coleman FastPitch Air Valdes 4 Person Tent is just the thing to knock my friends’ pop-up tents out of the park; the Valdes offers idiot-proof erection due to its inflatable pole system, with a high pressure valve for quick inflation and deflation, meaning  the tent can easily be put up by one person. The inflatable poles are made from strong and durable TPU material, encapsulated in a PE shell, and they can also be replaced if damaged.

It took us (I say us, but my role was mostly supervisor/beer taster) eleven minutes to put up the Valdes, from pulling it out of the bag to having a fully functioning fabric house (pump and manometer included). This is impressive for a tent we have never assembled before. It then took another eight minutes (I did help at this point) to peg down the guy-ropes and put the door together, which was very simple and only involved two elasticated poles. Even in some pretty strong winds, the inflatable poles held up well; there was no buckling, which we were quite surprised about. Due to the thickness of the poles, I believe they actually held up better in bad weather than our old tent.

The Valdes is incredibly easy to put up but that alone isn’t the making of a good tent - it also needs to be comfortable to live in for extended periods of time. My absolute favourite thing about the Valdes is the blackout bedroom; I mean, what a brilliant idea for such a glaringly (literally) obvious issue. The entire bedroom compartment is lined with blackout material that blocks 99% of daylight, meaning you won’t be woken up at 6am semi-blinded by the sun. It also means that if you are camping with kids, you can put them to bed at any time. The blackout material also acts as a form of temperature control, making it up to five degrees cooler in the daytime and one degree warmer at night. We didn’t notice much difference at night but we did notice the effect in the daytime - it was still warm, but nothing compared to our old sweat-box.

There is bags of room in the tent - it‘s like living in the TARDIS. The XXL bedroom is bigger than some student accommodation; we didn’t bother with the divider as it was just the two of us, meaning we had room for an extra high double airbed, all of our clothes and nearly enough room left over for a game of twister. Our dining/binge drinking room could house full height camping table and chairs with enough room to store all our cooking equipment at night.

The final feature that scored brownie points was the hinged door; I never considered how annoying it was unzipping and clambering over tent doors until I didn’t have to. The Valdes’ door simply pushes open and swings closed, making it easy to pop in and out to grab belongings without having to display the inside of your tent to your camp mates or fumble with the zips. We found that it kept the tent cleaner and also helped to keep out those pesky bugs that usually dive inside the moment the door is open.

As we are much more about comfort these days, we don’t pitch our tent far from our car. That turned out to be lucky, as the Valdes weighs 18.5kg (just over 2.5 stone!) You wouldn’t want to lug this tent all the way from the carpark to your camping pitch, like you need to do at some festivals.

However, the weight aside, the Valdes is everything you could want in a tent and then some; roomy, cool temperature, blackout bedrooms and an absolute breeze to put up and take down. It will protect you against harsh weather and be your home from home year after year - hats off to Coleman. RRP £599.99

For Latest Price Click Below

Buy now

5 out of 5

Pros

Hinged door

Inflatable pole system

Quick to put up and take down

Can be assembled by one person

Blackout bedroom

Temperature control

Two XXL rooms

4000mm hydrostatic head

Fire Retardant

Cable openings

Cons

Heavy (18.5kg)