by Jeff Osgood
It takes about three minutes for me to realize I’m not prepared. The six-person tent needs to go up and the light is fading and the rain’s about to move back in. It’s only my second go-round with this tent and the first was in our backyard in broad daylight where the stakes slid into the ground as easy as a straw into a milkshake. Now, under the dripping pines just outside Sand Dunes National Park with the wife and kids watching anxiously from our van, it’s a different game. The stakes barely puncture the gritty granite ground and the black loops and hooks on the tent are disappearing before my eyes.