CLAM 10809 Tent, Large, Camouflage

I'm glad I read the reviews first. I learned six important things.1. The brown has the rain flaps with velcro that adds to rain protection. The green does not have these added flaps. Our neighbors with the green were disappointed in theirs when they saw ours.2. The brown side panels come with windows, green does not. But green can drop the side panels half way, if ventilation is needed. If you have green and want to buy the brown window side panels, the Velcro is in a different place.3. Tie a cord to the center, BEFORE, you push it up. Short people can retract it easier. We added a loop to hang a light from.4. Buy all 6 sides. We adapted the one for the door by adding extra ties at the top and sides. This made the Brown clam almost rain tight, even in heavy, sustained rain for days. I installed a small carribeaner to hook to the zipper. Soooo happy we did this. We place a rubber mat at the door to cover the gap in the screen at the bottom.5. Lay a large tarp on the ground first. Then drop the clam on top of it. Trim away the tarp, leaving enough room to fold it and install grommets either inside or outside. Cut the tarp so you have a "door mat" at the door. Mark the tarp front so the clam " door" is always at the same place for the mat. With sides in place, there is no soggy bottom either when it rains.6. At the end of the rope ties, add carrabeaners. When you set up, you clip them to the rings. When you add the side panels, you just unclicp them, install the ring through the whole and reclip. Without the carribeaners, I had to undo the stakes, relocate the ties, and recinch the lines. My husband didn't get this until he helped me set it up. We also replaced the black ties with orange ones so they are easier to see at night.This unit is so compact that we can put all our new supplies in the same bag. Instead of putting up our 12x18 awning, which takes 1/2 hour and much engineering, my husband has virtually abandoned it in favor of the clam. Our awning has torn in heavy winds and this little clam stands like a rock. It did fly away on its own one day before we staked it. We got caught up in a conversation with neighbors who were admiring it and off it went! So make sure you stake it early in your setup.

As a long time camper I have seen and enjoyed 5 decades of improvements in tent technology. This is the best yet! Terrific detailed design! No bottom? No problem. We laid down a 7' by 11' paver addition to my back patio. (FYI - 12 inch pavers are no longer a true 12 inches.) We have had it up for 3 months and 10 inches of rain. (That is a lot for LA adjacent!) The rain simply rolled down the screen and off the bottom flaps into the ground. We know not to put in anything touching the screen, so nothing got wet. We put water seal on a big piece of quarter inch plywood and any water draining onto the pavers simply went under that and drained out through the sand. The Clam is very strong and keeps its tension and shape even in the wind. We weighed down the flaps on the outside with 2 five gal buckets of fine gravel and 4 double gravel filled tubes meant to tie around canopy legs. I can look out my kitchen window, see who is in the Clam and which flowers are blooming on the other side of it. Nice. We previously purchased a large opaque canopy that was impossible for us to put up & we tossed it. We watched the video 3-4 times, saw where to pull and push, and it really was that easy to put up! Pay attention to doing each step in the right order. Mosquitoes have not been terrible this year, but we always keep the door zipped shut. I hate those tiny Asian Tiger mosquitoes - no buzz before they bite. This keeps them out, too. This is easily the best tent I've purchased and I paid $100 more for my last one. We are happy backyard campers.

OK so here is the positive and the negative I will definitely say that this is the fastest going up gazebo I’ve ever seen literally less than a minute to put it up and literally less than a minute to take it down. I bought three side panels for privacy unfortunately the Velcro didn’t match up exactly on the top so I had to put self adhesive Velcro to match up to the gazebo which was OK it worked out perfect. It is very sturdy and made very well I’ve used it about eight times since I got it in June I purchased it for Camping for over the picnic table by our camper I will say when it’s hot out it definitely feels like a sauna inside it’ll definitely be awesome in the fallThere are two small spots in the screen where it looks like it wants to separate probably half the size of a dime so before it ripped I took heavy duty carpet thread and loosely stitched a little bun so it wouldn’t tear And create a hole I alsoPurchased 1 inch iron on Little bees and of course I couldn’t iron them on so I glued them on the thread on each side with E-6000 glue so you didn’t see the thread and it looked cute. I’ve actually had a couple people say oh my gosh I’ve never seen such huge bees and of course I had to laughHere’s the negative and a warning whatever you do watch the video we were in a hurry one day setting up and yes it is very easy to get it inside out and it is a nightmare to get it back fortunately we did a few hours later and I promise you we will never make the same mistake it is very difficult to get back to the way it supposed to be. Otherwise we absolutely love the gazebo and I hope we get a few years out of it. 😁