Camping with Skandika.

Being a family who enjoys the great outdoors and having adventures in nature we have always said that we want to go on camping holidays together as a family. Having no experience of camping and no camping equipment whatsoever we were delighted when German outdoors manufacture Skandika offered to send us a tent and some sleeping bags to get us started on our camping adventures.

The Skandika Korsika 8 man tent is a large tent that has room for up to 8 people. The tent consists of a large living space and 3 separate sleeping cabins. A sun shade is also incorporated into the tent's design at the entrance.

The tent's features such as 3,000 mm water column, innovative PU coated polyester material which makes the tent UV resistant, and flysheet with mud flap provide protection from the elements including wind and rain.

The tent is supplied in a useful carry bag, perfect for transporting and storing the tent and accessories. Along with the main tent a cover for the inner tent floor, and accessories such as tent pegs and guy ropes, and a manual are included.

Being complete camping and tent novices, putting up a tent especially such a large tent was a completely new experience and a challenge for us. To be honest the first time we used the tent and set about pitching the tent it was a slow and arduous experience. Whilst the tent came with a manual being so inexperienced meant that 'tent talk' was a completely foreign language to us.

With time and patience though we figured out what we needed to do to construct the tent and what pieces went where. The colour coded poles definitely helped make pitching the tent easier. Once we got stuck in pitching the tent it soon became obvious what we needed to do and I think that over time as we camp more often and pitch the tent again and again it will become quicker and easier, becoming second nature to us. Whilst I believe practice makes perfect and that it will become easier for us, I think due to the size of the tent it will always be a 2 man job.

Once the tent was pitched it became apparent just how big it actually is, it is huge! With the living room being so big it became obvious how little camping equipment we actually have. The large living space is perfect for keeping everything you need for camping along with bags and food. Even when we expand our camping equipment there will always be plenty of room in the tent for storing it all plus having room to relax and entertain in after adventures out and about. Thanks to the fact that the tent has more than 6.5ft headroom none of us had to crouch in the tent and it did not feel claustrophobic at all.

Thanks to the poles made from shatter proof fibre glass, tent pegs and guy ropes the tent felt very secure even when the winds picked up a little during the night.

The tent is designed with lots of useful features such as extra poles for a sun canopy and handy hook for hanging a lantern. Also included in the tent's design are air vents and blinds to let plenty of air and light into the tent. The 'windows' blind include zip opening, along with velcro and toggles to secure in place.

Inside of the tent the 3 sleeping cabins are spacious and all come with mosquito mesh. The sleeping cabins have zip doors for privacy and the mosquito mesh surrounding hangs cleverly from the tent with toggles.

The tent is a lovely dome design and the layout is great. 

During our camping trip we tried out the Skandika sleeping bags we were sent.

For Bug we had the colourful Vegas Junior sleeping bag that was roomy and comfy for him to snuggle down in for a surprisingly comfortable and long night's sleep. A bonus of the eye-catching and cosy sleeping bag is that when not being used for camping Bug can use it for sleepovers.

We also made use of the comfortable mummy-style Alaska adult sleeping bag which came with a very useful compression stuff sack making storing the sleeping bag after use very easy.

Overall we love the Skandika Korsika 8 man tent and the high quality Vegas Junior and Alaska sleeping bags that provided comfort and warmth when camping. We cannot wait to use the tent and sleeping bags more over the years as we enjoy camping as a family. Hopefully we will have many an enjoyable camping night spent in the Korsika 8 tent and we will expand our camping equipment so that we have everything we need for camping holidays as a family across the UK.

* Skandika provided the tent and sleeping bags for this post *