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Hi all, just booked up for a week at warren farm in Brean for the first week in June. Also got a week booked for park foot in the lakes in august. Now, for those weeks we will be using our idaho xl, but we also plan on having numerous weekends away without the children.

I have been searching a lot for a 'weekend tent' and have finally settled (I think) for the outwell virginia 5, but unfortunately cant find any reviews. Apparently it's exclusive to yeomans and a good price at £149.99. Can anyone on here recomend it?

Too "new" for any owners yet I think.

Said tent is here. Looks about right for my "downsizing" needs but I'd need to see one for real.

Very similar to the Icarus in spec and price, but at the moment (in my quest at least) Icarus wins purely because I've seen one.

OK, this is where I admit that TheShaggyDA is my better half :-) I was there and saw the Outwell Virginia 5 with him.

It's really been bugging me that the Virginia is so much cheaper, I couldn't see where Outwell had chopped anything to make that savings, just the fiberglass poles instead if metal didn't seem enough as the Nevada M has them. Now I get it. The inner tent is one piece/one room with a curtain in the middle thats only attached to the ceiling. It has a toggle at each corner to attach it when it's down, and it rolls up horizontally. So where you can take out one of the inner tents in the Nevada, you can't do that in the Virginia.

For the money it's a heck of a tent. One of the things that may rule it out for us is that we have been told there is no extension made for it should we want to add one some day.

 Thanks for posting the pics, it has helped me decide to get one, will be ideal for weekend camp trips, and when the grandson wants to come along, seems very good quality and value for the money.

Thanks for posting those photo's. 

Did you happen to notice whether the eyebrow pole above the side door was pre-angled??  This is an improvement for this year and I just hope it's included in the Virginia.

We took a punt on the Virginia even though we hadn't seen one in the flesh.  We've got 3 Outwell's now and happy with them all, so confident this one will be good too.

It arrived this week, but I can't pitch it today as planned because it's peeing it down.

I know many people have recommended the Vango Icarus, but we thought the Outwell was worth the extra few pounds for 2 main reasons.

1. It's 3000mm HH versus the Vango's 2000mm - and surely "waterproof-ness" is the major factor when choosing a tent.  

2. The Outwell has insect mesh on ALL doors whereas the Vango doesn't have it on the big front door.  This was a major factor for us because it's nice to keep as many doors open as possible in the warm evenings, but without inviting in all the bugs.

Hopefully it will be dry tomorrow, so I can pitch it and have a proper look.

Quote: Originally posted by Olly70 on 20/3/2010

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I know many people have recommended the Vango Icarus, but we thought the Outwell was worth the extra few pounds for 2 main reasons.

1. It's 3000mm HH versus the Vango's 2000mm - and surely "waterproof-ness" is the major factor when choosing a tent.  

2. The Outwell has insect mesh on ALL doors whereas the Vango doesn't have it on the big front door.  This was a major factor for us because it's nice to keep as many doors open as possible in the warm evenings, but without inviting in all the bugs.

Hopefully it will be dry tomorrow, so I can pitch it and have a proper look.

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Hi,

Sorry to be a pain, I started another thread on the Virginia 5 and then saw this thread - sorry about that!

When you say the Outwell has mesh on all of the doors, are you refering to the Virginia 5 or another Outwell?  We are keen on the Virginia 5 as well but mesh on the doors is very important to us!  We haven't been able to have a look at one yet to confirn whether it does or not.

Than ks in advance for your help.

Marcus

Thanks for the confirmation!

I've had a look on the Yeoman's website and am just about to press the "buy" button.  In looking at the webpage for the Virginia 5, Yeoman's don't seem to have a foorprint for the tent despite the fact that their tent catalogue indicates that there is one - there's certainly not one on the Yeomans website!

Do people think that it would be acceptable to use the Minnesota 4 footprint with the Virginia 5?  The specs seem to indicate that they have the same dimensions - eg 3.15m x 4.80m.

For that matter do people think that the Minnesota 4 carpet could be used with the Virginia 5 as well?

I realise that this is early days but I guess the question is directed at those of you who have already made the purchase of a Virginia 5 - namely, what did you do, if anything, for a footprint groundsheet to use with the tent?

Thanks in advance.

Marcus