The trial run at home before the first trip

Give it an afternoon, and finish it after dark

Set aside a few hours with daylight at the start and darkness at the end. The daylight is for the pitch and the packing; the dark is for the lamp, the stove and getting into the bag, because those are the three things you will otherwise do for the first time at the end of a long walk.

Lay everything out and count it against a list

Empty every bag onto a floor and write down what is there. This is the point at which you discover that the tarp was sold without guylines, that the hammock straps and carabiners are a separate purchase, or that the tent’s peg bag holds sixteen where the pitching instructions call for eighteen.

Weigh each item as you go if you have scales, and write the number next to it. That list is the basis of everything on the packing page, and it takes ten minutes now against an evening later.

Pitch the shelter once, following the instructions

Open the instructions even if the shape is obvious. What you are looking for is the pitch order the maker intends — which pole goes in first, whether the fly and inner go up together, and where the guy points are.

Check as you go:

• Do all the pole sections connect, and does the shock cord still pull them together? A slack cord is the usual reason an old or badly packed pole will not stand up.
• Does the footprint, if you bought one, sit inside the tent floor rather than out past the fly? A footprint that sticks out collects rain and channels it underneath, which is the opposite of the job. Universal sheets should be cut 3 to 5 cm inside the floor on every edge.
• Do the guylines run to their tensioners, and are they long enough for a pitch where the pegs have to go further out?

Look hard at the pegs that came in the bag

Push a few into the ground by hand. Tents ship with the cheapest pegs the maker can supply, and this is the moment to find that out. The general-purpose answer is a Y or V cross-section peg in 7075 aluminium, which resists twisting in turf; round steel nail pegs take a hammer into stony or baked ground where an alloy peg folds. Carrying two types rather than eighteen of one covers far more pitches.

Check the peg diameter passes through your own tent’s peg-out loops before you order replacements.

Inflate the mat and lie on it properly

Not for a minute — for twenty, in the position you actually sleep in. This is what tells you whether the thickness is enough for a side sleeper’s hip, and whether the width leaves your shoulders and elbows on the floor.

Count the breaths or pump strokes it takes to inflate, and note whether it holds pressure overnight. A mat that is soft in the morning in a garden is a mat you can return.

Get into the bag with the liner you intend to use

A liner only works if its shape matches the bag. A rectangular liner inside a mummy bag concertinas around the legs; a mummy liner in a rectangular bag pulls the corners in. Get in, do the zip up, pull the hood cord, and find out in a warm garden whether you can work the drawcords in the dark.

Where a liner maker states that it adds a number of degrees, that is the manufacturer’s own claim: it depends on the bag, the mat and the sleeper, and no standard governs it. The bag’s own comfort and limit figures, where the maker names EN 13537 or ISO 23537, are laboratory values measured on a heated mannequin — an indication for comparing bags rather than a promise, and the maker’s guidance governs use.

Light the stove outside, with the pot you own

Read the stove manual first, and follow it on where the stove may be used. Then:

• Check the canister valve goes on cleanly. A threaded EN 417 canister and a bayonet stove is a stove you cannot light, and that is a discovery for a garden, not a col.
• Boil a measured volume and time it, so you know what the maker’s published boil time means with your pot and your weather.
• Try the simmer control. A stove that only boils is a different object from a stove that cooks.
• If you have bought a windshield, read the stove manual again. Makers of upright canister stoves generally state that a full wrap-around shield must not be used, because it traps heat around the canister; remote-canister and liquid-fuel stoves are usually sold with one.

Check the pot’s internal diameter swallows the burner and the canister. That single fact decides more packed volume than the weight of either.

Fill and empty the water system

Fill the bottle, the bladder or the reservoir at a tap, and then empty it and work out how it dries. A bladder that cannot be turned open and hung flat is a bladder that will be thrown away, and now is when you buy the brush set rather than in a month.

If you have a filter, set it up on tap water exactly as the instructions describe, including the backflush step, so that the sequence is familiar before it matters. What the filter is stated to do, and whether any source is safe to drink, are separate questions that belong to the manufacturer’s instructions and to local authorities.

Do the last hour in the dark

Turn every light off. Find the head torch by feel, switch it on, and walk the length of the garden on the middle setting rather than the maximum — that is the level an evening actually uses. Check the lock mode works, and find the red mode before you need it.

Then get into the shelter in the dark, with the doors done up, and see whether you can reach the things you will want at three in the morning.

Pack it all back into the bags it came from

The last step is the one people skip, and it is the one that tells you the truth about packed size. Roll the mat, stuff the bag, fold the tent, and see whether it all goes back. Dry bags need the roll-top folded over at least three times before the buckle clips, so a 10 litre bag holds rather less than 10 litres of kit.

Write down three things that annoyed you

That short list is your next three purchases, in order, and it will be a better list than any you could have written before the rehearsal.