Help us live in a tent this summer!

Hi, fellow Northwester here. You'll be in Olympia in May. It will rain. A lot. Your stuff is going to get wet at some point, so I would caution against the futon pad. Once it gets wet it will be very difficult to dry out well, and you don't want a mold/mildew problem in your tent. Go with a good air mattress or a quality camp pad made for this. Forget about your wood pallets. You run the risk of puncturing or tearing your tent fabric, and as you'll be shoeless inside your tent, you really don't want a stubbed toe, splinters, or worse a rusty nail. You don't need to keep your bedding elevated off the tent floor anyway, because... Trench around your tent, a good foot out from the tent and all around, with runoff to the downhill corner. Use tarps and groundcloths, too. A small section of astroturf staked down outside the tent door will make such a difference in how clean your tent stays inside. Have a broom with fine/gentle bristles for sweeping up. Coarse bristles are to be avoided as they can perforate tent walls. If your tent has awnings, use them. If not, consider adding one or more, or get one of those portable gazebo things. Having a "porch" to retreat to, outside of the tent, does wonders for your sanity. Batteries for emergencies, lanterns for most of your lighting. If you have the space outside your tent, something like http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000CFOUEU/metafilter-20/ref=nosim/ or http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000RMSF1C/metafilter-20/ref=nosim/ helps a lot. The more stuff you can keep outside of your tent, the roomier and less claustrophobic it will feel inside. If you'll be storing your food, you'll need some kind of reasonably secure locker (the above can be made to work, a couple additional ratcheting straps around the door is a good idea) to keep the food in, and for heaven's sake store the food and your foody-smelling kitchen kit OUTSIDE the tent, preferably well away from it. Your tent is not a bear or cougar deterrent, and in SW WA we have plenty of both. Most of what people commonly think is animal- (especially bear-)proof is not. I have a http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B001QGW3A2/metafilter-20/ref=nosim/ that I take on backpacking trips. If you don't have a sturdy food locker, you could wind up in trouble. Common backpacking method is to throw a line over a sturdy tree limb at least 15 feet off the ground, and hoist your food containers up most of the way (but not snug to the limb, or tree-dwellers have easy access to it.) Again, well away from your tent. Your Coleman stove looks good. Skip the small canister, get a 20lb or larger refillable tank, and a http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0009PURNG/metafilter-20/ref=nosim/. Run all your stuff off this. Cheaper (you're talking two months straight usage here) and so much more convenient. What to use on your propane tree? Your stove, lanterns, infra-red heaters (so nice). Don't know what your budget is, but there are even propane-powered generators available. (Couple thou.) Have a few sets of tough place settings. Enameled steel plates & cups are a tried and true favorite, tough plastic like Texas Ware is also a good choice. Plenty of flatware and cutlery. Have some way to wash and dry your dishes, and dispose of gray water. (Hint, nowhere near your camp, as your wash water will have food in it, which will attract animals.) Get your kitchen kit together and practice cooking with it before you start camping, if possible. Cooking on a propane camp stove is an entirely different skill set than cooking on a home kitchen range. One-skillet meals are your friend. Lots of hashes and casseroley kinds of things. Stews with dumplings. Potatoes are a base for almost anything. Nothing beats properly seasoned and cared-for cast iron. But if you're not used to cooking with it and caring for it, you're probably better off with quality stainless steel. Teflon is probably not a good idea. I don't know what your facilities will be like, but when I'm camping, washing up means rubbing out the pots with sand from the river. Size your cookware to your stove. Huge 18" skillets are wonderful, but not when half of it is hanging off the stove, or it makes your second burner useless. Smaller, deeper pots are better. If necessary, you can make do with just a good stock pot. You can fry in it, make soups, stews, you can make pan bread in it, you can heat your wash water. If you have the budget/space, consider a griddle sized to sit atop your Coleman stove. Get an enameled steel percolator. Even if you don't drink coffee, you'll want a way to heat some water other than your cook pot. If you can use a camp fire, your cooking possibilities just more than doubled. Dutch oven! Roasting sticks, heck there are all sorts of sandwich makers, grill baskets, etc for cooking over an open fire. Rope and tent stakes. You really can never have enough. Outside table for eating, games, repairing things, etc. Always be aware of carbon monoxide and of course fire danger with fuel-burning equipment, but that infra-red heater can be a good way to warm up and dry out a damp tent. Always carefully attended, of course. Set up a sturdy (1/2" or better) rope between a couple trees as a clothes line, and air out your sleeping bags and blankets as frequently as possible. Beat them like you would a carpet, not only to shake out pine needles and bugs, but also to shake up the insulating fibers in your sleeping bag and help restore some of its loft, which will keep you warmer and more comfortable. Take your shoes off before entering the tent, but bang them together to knock the dirt off and bring them in with you at night. There is nothing, nothing worse than slug trails (welcome to Washington!) all over your shoes. Or worse, in them.

Don't pitch your tent next to the pony tailed dude who plays the guitar. For a couple of reasons.

Seconding Jessamyn on the groundcloth, and since you'll be there for a while, bother to trench your tent and be ready to use a tarp for extra protection/living space during rainy days.

Oh, also, at least once a week move all your stuff to the side and sweep under it. Centipedes and their brethren like to hide under things that don't move around a lot.

Here to repeat the advice to get a big-ass tarp and create an entire zone around your tent with it. This is one essential step to making a campsite livable long-term. Definitely don't drape it over your tent - it's not as waterproof, plus, you'll practically suffocate. http://www.mdavis.us/Camping/Camping%20Pictures/Campsite%20Tarps.jpg - create a big zone and pitch your tent within that zone. There are a ton of great suggestions here, but another thing I'd recommend is just finding a state park near you that has weekend camping, and just taking a stroll through the campground. You'll get inspired by all the pro tips you can see around campsites. People who camp a lot have really perfected some long-term outdoor living systems. My best tip from the six summers I spent in a canvas-roofed cabin is to have what's called a "foot towel." This is just a ratty towel you keep near your bed. Before you get in bed each night, dust your feet off with it. Near your cooking area, have a bucket of sand and a 5-gallon tar-type bucket filled with water. Just in case of fire. Also, if you can make a firepit, cooking on that is a nice alternative to cooking on the Coleman stove. I cooked on one for six weeks during a camping trip out west, and it was serviceable, but it's nice to get a break from it.

Nothing, nothing, nothing may rest on the floor for more than a day. Rising damp will mildew anything left there. Since your tent is fairly small, this problem will persist - it won't take much for moisture to seep to the soil in the center of your tent. The ground will be dry to the touch, but still give off humidity. Organize. Have structures - shelves, stacked crates, whatever - with designated uses (dirty clothes, my clean clothes, your clean clothes, toiletries, food prep stuff), so you can find things. The first time you lay a shirt down in the wrong place, something will go missing for hours or days. Really. And "turning the tent inside out" looking for an item will increase the mess, while possibly not even finding the item. Tents are devious that way. I camp once a year for two weeks at Pennsic; the more I pre-organize my layout and placement of stuff, the better it goes. Everything that touches the ground - even the bed post feet - gets mildewy.

Set up a big-ass tarp over the tent for rain. Do not drape it over the tent, you need to hang and stake it over the tent in a manner so that it slopes downward and at good angle. The first times it rains go out and check on it and make sure that rain is not pooling up on it somewhere. Also, treat your tent with at least two cans of silicon waterproofing spray. hist the floor pan seams and lower walls especially hard.

Some good advice in this old thread about http://ask.metafilter.com/158970/Any-advice-for-longterm-tent-camping.

Putting a tarp over the tent sounds kind of half-assed to me, but I guess it could work if it's not too windy. No, it is essential, no commercial tent outside of an expedition model will actually stay dry for very long with just the fly, no matter how you seam-seal.