A great weekender: The Vango Ravello 500

You might have invested in a great big family tent, plus all the furniture to go with it.

Perhaps you had a great family holiday in it last summer?

Now, with the weather improving, you book a campsite for the weekend and take it away again. Only this time things don’t go as well as when you took it on holiday last summer.

Why? Well, there’s nothing wrong with the tent. However, the effort in packing the car, putting up the tent, fitting it out, only to do it all again in reverse the next day as you pack it away. You soon find that you spent a lot of the weekend setting up or packing away.

If you have a big family tent, taking it just for a single night at the weekend can be a lot of effort. Not impossible, but a lot of effort.

Fortunately, there’s a simple alternative: get a smaller tent for the weekend.

Yes, the idea of getting a smaller tent just for the weekend may at first appear excessive, but a lot of family campers have two (or more) tents.

Why get a Weekend Tent

There are a few excellent reasons:

They are smaller and easier to pack so that you can get away quicker at the weekend.

As a weekend tent is smaller than your large holiday tent, you take less furniture. Again, this helps reduce the time required for packing and setting up, and then packing away again afterwards.
Yes, you might be ‘roughing it’ compared to your main tent set-up, but for just a night or two, you will find it no problem.

Suddenly, the ability to check the weekend weather on Friday and decide to take the kids camping becomes a real possibility.

After all, in the UK, we have to grab what good weather we have when we can.

Vango Ravello 500 Tent

The Vango Ravello 500 Tent is such a tent I would class as a great tent to take away at the weekend.

It is like a smaller version of Vango’s big family holiday AirBeam tents.

What’s more, as it is an AirBeam tent, it’s inflatable. So, setting up is a breeze.

Vango sent us one over so we could get a closer look at this tent.

Inflating the Ravello 500

The Ravello was very easy to pitch. Anchor the corners with the supplied pegs, and inflate each AirBeam tube.

The pump locks onto the valve and also has a pressure gauge.

Being a smaller size the some of the larger family tents, the Vango Ravello is easy and quick to inflate.

The Vango Ravello 500 Layout

You have a small living space, which will give you space for your bags, and enough space if you need to spend some time ‘indoors’.

The bedrooms are at the back of the tent.

Technically the bedrooms can take five people, though you have to remove the divider for that. I expect that most families would use the tent with the divider and two double bedrooms.

As well as the big entrance at the front of the tent, there’s a side door with a small porch. This side door is great if the weather changes and it starts to rain, as you should get less water in the tent using this door.

Not ‘roughing it’ too much

You can get a carpet for the Ravello 500: the Vango Universal Carpet 240x300cm.

We found this a decent carpet and insulated the tent well. Even if going just for the weekend, it is worth getting the carpet in our opinion.

Not just for weekends

Of course, if you have a smaller family, the Ravello 500 could be good enough as a family holiday tent, though you might find the living space a little small if you intend to get furniture.

The Vango Excel Standard Awning appears the best match for the Ravello 500 if you do want more space for longer camping breaks.

Recommendation

We’ve already had a few weekends away in the Vango Ravello 500. It’s been a great tent and gets the GOWTK Thumbs Up award.

Alternatives

Another weekend tent we’ve tried and was impressed with is the Outwell Earth 5. Click here to see our review.

Thanks, Credits, & Disclaimers: We would like to thank Vango for sending us a Vango Ravello 500 and Universal Carpet to review.

Location photo credits are with GetOutWithTheKids.co.uk; Excel Awning product shot photo credit to Vango.

All opinions are our own.

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