For the 2008 model year MSR not only reworked the regular Hubba Hubba and shaved a little weight off it, but also brought out a new version, the “Hubba Hubba HP”. That new version is a good 200 grams lighter again, achieved with different fabrics for the fly and the inner tent. Thanks to its less airy inner tent, the Hubba Hubba HP is meant to cope better with poor weather.
We tested the tent in Florida in early March and at Lake Garda in Italy at the end of March.
MSR Hubba Hubba HP in detail
Sleeps: 2
Doors: 2
Vestibules/porches: 2
Inner tent floor area: 2.7 m² (1.30 m x 2.10 m)
Vestibule area: 1.6 m²
Height: 100 cm (at the highest point)
Total weight: 1.88 kg
The essential difference between the regular Hubba Hubba and the Hubba Hubba HP is that the HP’s inner tent uses less mesh and more fabric, which is meant to give slightly better weather protection. The fabrics for the fly and the floor are also a little lighter.
What comes with the MSR Hubba Hubba HP
- Stuff sack
- Inner tent + fly
- Pegs
- Poles
Pitching the MSR Hubba Hubba HP
The tent is very simple and quick to pitch. The inner tent goes up first: spread it out and fix it down with four pegs. Then assemble the poles and attach them to the inner tent with the clips. After that you simply throw the fly over the top and attach it to the poles as well. Put in the last pegs, guy it out, and the tent is standing. The whole thing takes only a few minutes.
Both the inner tent and the fly can also be pitched separately. In theory you could put the fly up first in the rain and then hang the inner tent inside, but in practice that is not so straightforward.
The Hubba Hubba HP in the field in Florida
The first pitch of the MSR Hubba Hubba HP took only a few minutes, with no trouble and without a glance at the instructions. The first impression is simply good. Everything is cleanly made and well thought through. The tent is very roomy — two people have plenty of space. You can sit up comfortably inside and pull on a jumper without your elbows hitting the walls, because the inner space does not taper upwards towards the middle as sharply as it does in many other tents of this design.
March in Florida brought considerable swings in temperature. Over 25 degrees during the day, down to freezing at night.
Inevitably, substantial amounts of condensation formed overnight on the inside of the fly (two people in the tent). The inner tent stayed dry, though. The fly, correctly guyed out in the evening, was pulled extremely taut by the next morning after a cold night (tip: in warm weather do not guy the fly too tightly, so that it still has some give when the temperature drops at night).
The MSR Hubba Hubba HP also had to see out two heavy thunderstorms in Florida. The tent stayed watertight. Its one weak point is that the short side walls at the head and foot ends are not guyed outwards as standard (no pegs or guylines supplied), so they hang fairly close to the inner tent. That makes it easy for splash-back from the ground to reach the inner. Since there are already two loops sewn onto the short sides, though, you can easily add two short guylines there. So do not forget to pack two short lines and two extra pegs!
That will add only slightly to a weight which, for such a roomy tent, really is low. What weighs more heavily is that — as with every tent in this category — you should definitely carry a groundsheet to protect the very thin floor. There is an original MSR footprint for it, but it is very expensive; a piece of ordinary builders’ sheeting cut to size will almost certainly do just as well.
Incidentally, with stuff sack and pegs the Hubba Hubba HP weighs just 1.88 kilos, which is even less than the 1.93 kg MSR quotes :-))
The Hubba Hubba HP in the field in Italy
The weather at Lake Garda was mostly quite good during the day at 10–12 °C, but at night temperatures dropped to as low as -4 °C. That naturally brought condensation with it. None of it ever made its way into the inner tent, and it dries off the fly fairly quickly. The tent also stood up bravely to the winds at Lake Garda, and showed no weakness in the rain.
We slept two to the tent every night — two fairly solid blokes — and even so the width of 1.30 m was enough, and the length of 2.1 m was more than adequate. If you are close to 2 m tall, though, you should at least lie down in one first, as I could imagine the length not being enough for very tall people. The tent also gets very low towards the ends. Headroom is excellent: at around 1 m you can get dressed without difficulty or play cards in the evening.
We used the tent with both the footprint and an additional sheet to protect the thin floor. It probably would not have been necessary, but when you spend that much money you would rather be careful. On the short sides we attached two short guylines to the fly to pull it further away from the inner tent, exactly as recommended in the other field report above.
Where to buy the Hubba Hubba HP
Update – The MSR Hubba Hubba HP is also available from Bergfreunde.de, likewise for around € 460.
In Germany the new Hubba Hubba HP can be had from the mail-order retailer “Larca” for around € 460. We bought our tent directly in the USA, where it is stocked by all the big online shops (rei.com, moontrail.com).
At the current dollar exchange rate, ordering from the USA is worth considering. Even adding shipping, VAT and the customs duty that is properly payable, you come out slightly cheaper than buying in Germany. The trouble involved should you ever need to make a warranty claim is worth bearing in mind, though.
