Why you should hang out with a hammock the next time you go camping

A hammock by the sea, a little stove to boil coffee;

Here is a secret that campers with decades of experience seldom reveal: they don’t bring tents; they bring hammocks.

“The ground will never be completely even. There will always be creepy-crawlies – even centipedes and scorpions – trying to enter your tent because it is a good shelter for them too.

“So I hitch up my hammock every chance I get,” said avid camper Datuk Boonler Somchit, 70.

Ho prefers using a 3.5m hammock to have more sleeping space.Unlike other countries with prairie lands or thousands of hectares of plains, the great outdoors in Malaysia are typically hilly and even downright mountainous.

“There will be roots jutting out of the soil. And you will spend a long time clearing brush on the tent grounds and sweeping away tiny stones that will jut through the ground sheet and make your night miserable. And imagine doing all that during a thunderstorm, even before you can pitch your tent,” said Boonler.

So instead, he would look for two stout trees around 3m apart to hitch his hammock to.

“It can be on a slope; it doesn’t matter. In three minutes, my hammock and tarp will be up,” Boonler stressed.

After some practise, plus the use of specially engineered hammocks costing RM1,000 or more, Boonler said he would only use tents on camping trips in places where there were no trees stout enough for him to hitch a hammock.

In contrast, however, fellow avid camper Kenny Ho, 66, avoids using expensive hammocks and locks his hammock budget at about RM100.

“I sleep with a folding knife in my pocket while camping and never once did I or my friends ever tear a hammock while using it in the normal way.”

But Ho admitted that, given a choice and if the situation allowed, he would prefer a tent.

“It takes more work, but you get lots of space. Stash your belongings, zip up your tent, and everything stays safe,” he pointed out.

Once, while camping with a hammock, Ho said he hung his backpack on a tree, and when he got back home and emptied his pack, a bright, red centipede over 30cm long scampered out.

A hammock by the sea, a little stove to boil coffee;

There is one inconvenient matter about hammocking.

Boonler calls it a “cold butt”, and Ho said: “It can get crazy cold in the jungle, and with just a thin layer of nylon between your back and the night air, you can be shivering by 3am”.

This is where Boonler’s preference for expensive hammocks comes into play, explaining that the denser stitching of the fabric keeps the wind out.

Ho solves the predicament with a hammock underquilt.

After tying his hammock, Ho clips the underquilt below the hammock to keep the night breeze out and his body heat in.

“The trick is to make sure there is a layer of air between the hammock and the underquilt. It is only the hammock that supports your weight, while the underquilt dangles closely but loosely just below the hammock,” Ho explained.

For the sake of their chosen trees, both Boonler and Ho shun the use of ropes to support the hammock and prefer strap webbing.

“My hammocks came with ropes, but I saw that the ropes bit into the trees and damaged the bark. Why hurt trees when we don’t have to? Strap webbing is flat and wide, so they distribute the load over a larger area,” explained Ho.

Tying the hammock at the right height requires trial and error.

When the day is done, it is a simple matter for Boonler to roll up his hammock into a tiny bundle where tarp, pegs, guylines and all are kept in a bundle less than 30cm long.

“If the trees you choose are close together, tie the straps at chest height. The further apart the trees, the higher up you tie the straps to the trees.

“You want the end result to be such that when you sit on the hammock, your knees are bent like you are sitting on a low stool, because your hammock is also your chair.

“You want to sit on it while cooking, eating, or doing camp chores in which you can sit down,” explained Boonler.

After setting up the hammock to perfection the first time, Ho recommends tying a taut structural ridge line of strong cordage across both ends of the set-up hammock.

“This ridge line helps you achieve the right amount of sag in your hammock every time you set it up, no matter the distance between your chosen trees, so that you don’t have to spend time making fine adjustments every time,” Ho pointed out.

Then comes the protection from rain.

“In a tropical jungle, especially near mountains, it can rain at any time. So the first thing you tie up once you decide on your camp site is the fly sheet.

“After that is up and all your gear is safe from the rain, then you work on your hammock,” said Boonler.

Above the hammock, another fly sheet may be needed, and while logic dictates that the hammock’s fly sheet needs to be larger than the hammock itself for good rain protection, Boonler prefers a trapezium shape while Ho prefers a rectangle.

Both veterans urge campers to explore the option by speaking with other experienced campers and trying out hammocking in safe locations such as parks before switching from tents to hammocks.