Hammock camping with the wife or significant other...

[bbanker]

Hello all,
There are smatterings of this info all over the place but I am interested in seeing how many of you approach hammocking for a couple sharing gear. My wife and I have been backpacking and motorcycle camping for a long time so are no stranger to gear. Often we camp with our (large) dogs. The last several years she has gone through breast cancer treatment and all of the subsequent fun that goes along with it, so hasn't really been able to go, but is now free and clear as of this spring. In the last several years, I've been converted to a hanger... Soooo, looking toward getting back on the trail, I'm looking for how some of you do it. I currently have a WBBB, Yeti 20 degree 3/4, and a 20 degree Mamba, as well as a Superfly tarp. I've never slept better in the outdoors. I really don't want to go back to the ground if I can help it. I'm a pack mule @ 6'1 and about #245 soaking wet, and she's 5'7 and about #115. I carry all of the cooking gear, water gear, porch tarp, etc... So what are your favorite setups?
Thanks in advance! So much great info and such a great vibe with this group.

[jellyfish]

I have gone backpacking with my niece (age 9) and we do very well with a side-by-side hammock setup so we are hanging off the same trees and sharing a wide tarp. I carry almost everything, though her kid backpack holds some of her stuff. It is a good setup and I think it would work well for adults also.

[jellyfish]

I use spreader bars on the tarp to keep it nice and spacious.

[Scottybdiving]

No need to go to ground. Even if she is under another tarp, she is still within conversation distance. My wife has her own setup and loves it.

[Apollo]

I've been going with my 8yr old son and doing the spreader bar under a superfly setup. Obviously there is quite a weight difference between him and I. The only things I would change would be to get a longer tarp. I can feel a fair amount of his movement in my hammock so if either of you is restless, that could be a challenge.

[SilkSleeper]

I use the dutchwear double chameleon. Before that my wife and I were ground sleepers. I find the double chameleon a little less comfortable, or more accurately a little harder to get comfortable in rather than a single hammock. That could be to the fact that there are two of us in one setup and every time one of us shifts the other one kind of shifts. But it also could be because I prefer to use pads in the hammock rather than underquilts (I find that they give me more back support and if I'm backpacking & find a camp without suitable trees for hammock then I can sleep on the ground) and they tend to slide around a little bit more. Maybe the double chameleon would be more comfortable with under quilts.
Either way the double chameleon has made hammocking with two people much easier. Even when I go with my son. This is because we only have to find two trees that are spaced pretty well instead of three or four trees that are spaced well but close together. There has been a few times that we were backpacking and had we had our own hammocks we would not have been able to set up our hammocks close to each other. Also, if you get the double chameleon I highly recommend tree straps rather than whoopie slings. I find the whoopie slings very difficult to use with the double chameleon.

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[cougarmeat]

I took a gathered end and a Bridge (Ridge Runner) to the park with my lady adventure partner and let her try both and pick the one she liked best. At this point in time, she prefers the Bridge Hammock. When we camp, her Bridge needs trees further apart and I set her's up first - tarp and all. My gathered end hammock is much less demanding on tree distance and I can usually find something close by. In addition to that, it is not unusual to set up a quick (just two or three poles) tent/fly. The tent is a place for gear and a place for the lady to change - women can be fussy like that.

I as we are older, I also use, "Close to the bathroom" - but not so close as to smell it - as criteria if the camp site has such facilities.

So I make sure she has a hammock she likes, has a privacy option, and is close to a bathroom.

If there is a need to be side by side, the spreader bars mentioned above would work - as would suspending the two hammocks each off the left/right side of the tree. But we spend enough time together when we are awake and these days she favors a good night's sleep over night time proximity. We are together but we don't need to be right next to each other together.

Note that it sometimes takes a day or two for the body to adjust to hammock sleeping. She eased into it by taking afternoon naps in one at the house. I'm sure it would only take a night or two "in the wild"; the first night might "feel weird" so be sure to expect an adjustment period.

[sidneyhornblower]

Way to go on getting through cancer treatment! That's the hardest thing anyone will ever do.

One HF member, who hasn't been quite as active recently but is still hanging around, has a nice blog called Couch2Trail, which is specific to him and his wife and might have some info:

https://couch2trail.wordpress.com/

[PlusOne]

The Double Dutch bugnet is what I use. It allows two chameleons to be set up under one bugnet, and the two hammocks are zipped together along the common edge. This has been great camping with the littles as I can reach over and comfort them or make adjustments to the quilts if needed. I also but a side sling between the two hammocks for added storage. As for my tarp, I just tried out Dutch's 12' Winter Hex tarp and it had plenty of room. Hope this helps.

[Baka Dasai]

I use two ordinary netless hammocks with a spreader bar at the head end, and it works fine. You notice it when your partner gets in or out of their hammock, or even if they shift around. It's a fairly gentle movement though. Sometimes it wakes me up, sometimes it doesn't.

The bigger the "V" formed by the two suspensions going to the spreader bar, the more gentle the movement will be.

When only one person is in the hammock, that hammock will be much lower to the ground than when both are in their hammocks. This means you need to set up the hammocks slightly higher off the ground than normal to allow for the drop when only one is weighted. That, and mucking around with two sets of tree straps on on the same set of trees can make the setup a little trickier than setting up a single hammock. If you're confident with setting up a single hammock you'll figure out the little idiosyncrasies of a tandem setup quickly though.

We each have a Fronkey-style bugnet, and these prevent us from reaching out and touching each other. We're right next to each other, but in our own little cocoons. The Double Dutch bugnet would be much better in this regard.

I originally tried this setup with my 11 ft hex tarp, but there really wasn't enough coverage. So I started using two 11 ft hex tarps (cos that's what I had), with the widest part of one lined up with the spreader bar, and the widest part of the other lined up with our feet. It was a real hassle to set up.

So I bought a Warbonnet Cloudburst, with external pole-mod, which is the ideal size/shape for tandem hanging (as long as you don't need doors). Your Superfly will probably work just as well, but you may struggle to close the doors.

Good luck!