I bet a fair amount of people fly in. They get there without a tent, purchase the cheapest one they can find and then leave it behind. Why would they want to try and repack and pay to check a filthy, cheap, potentially damaged tent that they have no intention of reusing. it's a symptom of a disposable lifestyle.
Yes exactly. I think a lot of people in this thread do not realize tents are as cheap as $20-$35.
$35 is a lot for some people. I would not leave trash/tents behind, but you bet i'm not wasting a couple hours + energy for $35 at the end of a long weekend.
I got to Magic (card game) events and ditch free stuff i get thats too large to fly with. What am i gonna do, stress myself so i can sell a $20 box i don't want? That's a freebie for someone else or i trash it
Same thing happens on Catalina Island. I did get a $200 REI sleeping pad that has a pin prick sized leak that I was able to fix when I got home. The tents that were abandoned were abandoned because they were crappy. We did use the ground covers as extra shade at our campsite.
It sounds like part of the issue is that they don't have Walmart tents. Ozark Trail (Walmart brand) tents are solid tents, so people in the US don't abandon tents because those are our regular car camping tents.
If you stay in a hotel, you don't get to take the hotel room home. And a tent is WAY cheaper.
They probably spend more on alcohol and drugs, and they don't get to take those home either. Call it a rental. If you're spending hundreds of dollars or more already, the cost of a tent is peanuts.
This is really stupid logic though. If they take it home, it still costs the same... they just don't have to buy another one for the next festival. What point are you arguing for?
The overwhelming majority won't fly to festivals. If they do, and they bring a tent, are you suggesting they'd get checked luggage one way but not the other so they throw away a tent to save themselves the fee? I'd imagine a significant amount of people who fly to festivals will not be camping anyway.
Cost money to fly it home, too. Many of these tents are oversized cargo, even when packed. So the cost of flying it home may be close to the entire price of the tent, bought in-situ.
People see these tents as disposable products much like a paper plate. You could clean off a paper plate and reuse it a few times but no one does that. These tents are often the cheapest ones they could find, like $50-$100 I imagine. Split 2-4 ways means you are going to spend more on a meal at these festivals than you did on the tent so if its destroyed or abandoned it doesn't really matter to them.
It is indeed dumb logic and wasteful but sadly that is how people think. They know the tent is going to be a wreck by the end of it, many of them do not camp out in tents normally and treat their tents like garbage so its inevitable that they get destroyed but like the other people have said, you dont get to take the hotel room home when you are done so if you treat your tent in the same way then it doesnt really matter to them if they leave it.
Surely those people would just camp in pre-pitched tents or some other premium sleeping system? It's cheaper AND easier to get a pre-pitched tent than it is to buy a tent...
There is simply no situation where buying a tent specifically to throw it away makes sense
Yeah youre right. The hundreds have no clue....or, people make different choices about how they live, what they are willing to waste etc.
Let's face it we all "waste". Maybe you drive an unnecessarily big vehicle or don't carpool when you could. Maybe you enjoy getting the newest and greatest phone every 2 years instead of dealing with a battery with a little less life.
The truth is unless the phone/computer you're using to post this is weaved with native grasses, you have a footprint youre responsible for too but you feel youre decisions are right for you.
Im not religious but maybe your are. "He who hath not sinned, cast the first stone." Your righteous indignation may make you feel temporarily superior but I highly doubt you don't leave a mark on this world.
If this field was left like this, I bet there were circumstances that led to this. Perhaps storms made organizers clear the site and the storm lasted long enough that people just bailed. Things can get really uncomfortable when youre cold, wet and unprepared for harsh weather. Let's say the weather wasn't projected to change for 30 hours and the festival would be over by then. Are you saying youd stay more than a day to get your soaking wet sleeping bag and tent, assuming they didnt get destroyed in storm?
No it's not a loss compared to your expenses if you were mentally accounting for staying at a hotel before that.
It's also not a loss if it's just shitty friends borrowing stuff from their friends and not giving you shit if they just have to be a little apologetic for their friend or something when they get back home.
In every festivalw there're abandoned tents. Even if 1% of them are stolen, it would still be impossible or some kind of conspiracy.
Bc tents aren't lying around to be stolen.
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u/whatsuperpowers 7h ago
Of course it's cheaper to stay on the grounds, but it's still a loss if you don't take the tent you paid for.