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I'm a bit new to all this but I want to get a family tent that has standing room for when the weather is bad.  I've been doing some research and the one I'm taken with is the Outwell Bear Lake, whilst it is pricey I figure that should equate to excellent quality and I want something that will last years.

My query is, what's the difference between the Bear Lake 4 and 6 as they look the same to me and also has anyone managed to get a better deal that the £720 that I can find and of course have I picked a good tent!

Cheers!

It's an excellent tent, but it is big and heavy. You're very new to the world of tents and I'd really recommend that you take the time to visit an outdoor display of tents somewhere. Until then you can't really get an appreciation of the size, or the different materials, or the options available regarding sewn in groundsheets and canopies etc.

If you tell us where you're located we can recommend an outlet.

The Bear Lake 6 is wide than the Bear Lake 4. Have a look at Outwell's website for all the details and dimensions. www.outwell.co.uk

Thanks for your help.

I'm in Manchester, so if you know of any displays nearby that would be great.

Hello.

 Camperlands Northenden normally do a good display of tents.  Also Yeomans do an outdoor tent display, there's one in Calver from 1 April to 19 April. Go outdoors in Stockport also has some tents on display.

If you are spending that much I would definately try to see it before you buy.

We have a bear lake 4 and it is a fantastic tent but (as Astronaut says) it comes in 2 huge bags so please have a look at how big they are before you buy.

If they're not too big you won't be dissapointed with the tent

Hi and welcome to the forum

I love the bear lakes!

Here is some information that might help you decide:

Bear Lake 4 size:

Bear Lake 6 size:

I have the Bear Lake 6 for myself, hubby and our two labradors, I did look at the Bear Lake 4 but I prefer the space in the 6.

This website has a BL6 for £699 and if you use the price guarantee on the GoOutdoors website (http://www.ukcampsite.co.uk/redirect.asp?redir=http://www.gooutdoors.co.uk/price-guarantee) they match that price of £699 and then will give you an extra 10% so you could get one for £630

The BL4 seems to be selling for around the same sort of price, personally I would always opt for the BL6.

The bags are heavy, there is the tent bag and then a pole bag weighing:
Tent: 38.6 kg / Poles: 13.1 kg

If you want to read some reviews of both the BL4 and BL6 you can find them on this website here

And here are some pictures of the inside of mine to give you an idea of size, scroll down about halfway until you get to the pic of a labrador sprawled out on my bed

Hope that helps a bit

The Family Tent shop do the 2008 version for £595. Its exactly the same as the 2009 version!!

We went for the Bear lake 6 as its bigger than the 4. and its just the 2 of us!

Quote: Originally posted by truckeroxford on 05/4/2009

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get a gelert zenth 6 it is big and £300 from gooutdoors i think or cheper

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We have been looking at the Bear Lake 6 for a while and missed out buying it before the prices went up, however on the advice of Woofers we did a price match with Go Outdoors and got the tent for £629 plus had to buy their discount card which cost £4 but hopefully that will come in useful again.

The service was great and we took the tent out to pitch to make sure everything was ok on Tuesday.  We are really impressed with it and can't wait for our first trip this year which will be to Moffat in Scotland at the end of June.

Hi

we are about to put our Bearlake 6 on Ebay. Its a fabulous Tent as others have said and well worth the money but decided camping not for me so its going up for Sale after 1 outing for a weekend.

If you ge tthe opportunity to purchase 1 I would

Liz

Hi Beth26,

We have a Bear Lake 4 and don't get me wrong we absolutely love it, but if we had our time again we just may have gone for the Bear Lake 6 for the extra room.

Try and get a look at both the 4 and the 6 up in the flesh, so to speak, before you buy if you do decide one or tother is for you.

Katie 

GO for the Bear Lake 6 WITHOUT DOUBT - better still if you can do a deal on here or E-bay then what could be better than that !!  - there seems to be a few folk who buy these - then sell them quickly ( probably as they are just not suited to camping )  they will bring in excess of £500 on ebay for a newish one.  ( please also consider that there were some amazing deal knocking around on BL6s last year - I'v seen them as low as £549 - so anyone buying one - could use it a couple of times and then get back what they paid for it !

Yeomans at Wigan ( garden Centre )  have a BL6 on display ( they havd a 4 last year )

In my honest opinion - there is so so little difference in the time it takes to errect a BL6 than a BL4 - and the extra space you get  and the general "feel" of the tent is so much better - I hope I dont offend any BL4 owners here - but it also looks a lot nicer - its low and wide stance sets it appart

Go for the BL6

Simon