If necessity is the mother of invention then who’s the papa? Bill Gamber, founder of Big Agnes back in 2001, suggests that it must be convenience. For Bill it was a fitful sleep one night camping under the stars, when his bag kept slipping off the pad. How inconvenient. Yet, it was the perfect seed for inventing and marketing the first sleeping bag with a pad sleeve. After much determination, Bill is witnessing the expansion of his irreverently named outdoor retail company with new product lines venturing into tents, trekking poles, apparel, and other accessories.

I’ve been so happy with my BA Roxy Anne sleeping bag since ’08, that I was hoping it would just be a matter of time before my favorite sleeping bag manufacturer branched out. The timing of Big Agnes’ new tent line couldn’t have been more perfect for my recent southwestern solo. The Copper Spur UL2 tent was an obvious choice to flush out my lean and mean adventure kit to fit on my DRZ.

As it is with my adventure rides, weight, pack size, efficient design and durability top the list for all of the products that make it into my final kit. This freestanding shelter sold me with its dual doors, steep vertical walls, and hub/pole design. The tent body is ultra-lightweight nylon and polyester mesh and provides excellent ventilation. Both fly and floor are ultralight silicone-treated nylon rip-stop with waterproof polyurethane coatings. But, it’s the attention to fine detail that makes this one stand out over others. When the fly corners are hooked to the loops of the footprint corners it allows the entire unit to be picked up as one and moved before being staked. The foot side of the tent is narrower than the head, so BA has color-coded the poles and the footprint to match up the sides more easily.

With camp set-up being a breeze, who wouldn’t jump for joy inside this tent with its generous 42” head height? BigAgnes.com

MSRP: $399.95