How to Cool My Tent While Camping

Pitch the tent in a place where either local trees, a boulder, a hill or a cliff offer shade through the midday and late afternoon.

Spray the outside of your mesh windows with bug repellent and leave them open to make the most of your ventilation. Some campers keep their windows zipped up to keep out gnats, which can penetrate most forms of window mesh. Bug repellent will keep them away.

Lick you thumb every hour or so through the middle of the day and determine which direction the prevailing wind is blowing. Pull up your tent stakes and reposition your tent so that the wind is blowing through the largest windows. This will maximize your ventilation.

Avoid pitching your tents in dense forests, especially if there is plenty of moss and other signs of moisture around. Not only do the trees and underbrush limit breezes, but these places usually have much higher levels of humidity. It will seem at least a few and perhaps several degrees hotter in such locations.

Set up a battery-powered tent fan to improve on the tent's ventilation. These need to be set up to draw additional air through the tent's mesh windows for best overall effect. You should set a tent fan to blow directly on you only if you are the sole occupant of the tent.