Hilleberg Anjan 2 Tent Review

The Hilleberg Anjan 2 is a 2 person tent designed for three-season use. Weighing 3 lbs. 5 oz., it has a tunnel style architecture with two poles that slot into sleeves, not clips, making it more wind and weather worthy than most lightweight and ultralight tents sold today. While it is a double-walled tent, the outer fly can also be pitched first in rain to prevent the inner tent from getting wet.

If you’re not familiar with Hilleberg Tents, they’re a Swedish manufacturer with an international reputation for beautifully made, expedition-class tents. The Anjan 2 is one of their lightest weight models, built for people taking trips in wilderness locales like Alaska, British Columbia, Scotland, Sweden, or the Alps, where the wind and weather require a tent that has a high tear strength and superior waterproofing.  While you can use the Anjan 2 for thru-hikes or weekend trips, it’s a bit overkill, although it may be the last tent you ever need to buy because it’s so well-built.

Specs at a Glance

• Type: Double-wall, tunnel, 3 season
• Capacity: 2 people
• Doors: 1
• Vestibule: Yes
• Windows: 2
• Trail weight: 3 lbs 5 oz
  • Inner Tent: 1 lbs 3.4 oz
  • Rain Fly: 1 lb 7.4 oz
  • Poles (2): 11.1 oz
• Minimum number of stakes to pitch: 4
• Recommended number of stakes to pitch: 8-12, in windy conditions
• Materials:
  • Rain Fly: 20 D High Tenacity Ripstop Nylon 66, w/ triple silicone coating, and 5,000 mm hydrostatic head
  • Inner Tent Walls: 10 denier ripstop nylon
  • Inner Tent Floor: 50 denier ripstop nylon with polyurethane coating and a 12,000 mm hydrostatic head
• Inner tent dimensions (usable  space): 83″ long, 50″ wide (front), 43″ wide (rear), 39″ high
• Rain fly dimensions: length w/ vestibule – 127″, width – 51″
• Vestibule: length – 41″, width – 51″
• Colors: Dark green, red, sand

Rain Fly

The Anjan 2 is a tunnel tent with a front door, front vestibule, and a rear window that can be exposed for increased ventilation. The tent is held up with two poles that slide into sleeves along the top of the rain fly and curve to form the tunnel shape. The poles sleeves are very strong and help minimize any flapping of the rain fly in high wind, so you can get a decent night’s sleep. The two poles are different lengths but are color-coded so you know which sleeve to slide them into. In more extreme conditions, you can slide two poles into the sleeves to create an even stronger and weather worthy shelter. The tent also comes outfitted with additional guylines to anchor the tent down in high winds. They also help tension the silnylon as it relaxes after being pitched.

The rain fly is made with Kerlon 1000, a proprietary type of silnylon produced for Hilleberg, that is triple coated with silicone on both sides and has a hydrostatic head of 5000 mm. That’s approximately 3 times more waterproof than the typical tent sold at REI. The inner tent walls are made with 10 denier ripstop nylon, while the floor is made with 50 denier ripstop nylon with a polyurethane coating and has a hydrostatic head of 12,000 mm. The floor is so durable and waterproof that you don’t need to use a footprint with the Anjan 2.

When setting up the Anjan 2, it’s best to stake out the rear end of the rain fly, insert the two poles, and then pull on the front end of the fly (like a slinky) to fully expand the shelter before staking it down. Most people will normally pack the inner tent and rain fly pre-attached, except in inclement weather, when the rain fly can be set up first and then the inner-tent attached inside under cover. The inner tent is suspended from the outer using dowels attached to plastic cords, ensuring good airflow between the inner and outer walls, while helping to minimize any condensation transfer.

Once pitched, the Anjan 2 can be further secured using guylines attached to the pole sleeves. These are pre-attached and outfitted with line tensioners when the tent arrives, and not something that end users need to outfit themselves. While the use of these stabilizing guylines does increase the size of the open area required to pitch the tent, it makes for a very strong and stable structure, and helps counter some of the rain fly sag inherent in pitching a silnylon shelter.

Inner Tent

The inner tent has solid walls, although an all-mesh interior option is also available. It has a D-shaped, zippered mesh front door, with large pockets along the sides for gear storage. There’s even a clothesline running the length of the ceiling to hang up wet clothes or suspend headlamps and lights. The solid wall inner tent is best used when you want more interior warmth such as spring or autumn, while the mesh inner tent best for ventilation in summer. Since they hang underneath the fly and attach with dowels, you could buy both and use them in different seasons.

The most convenient way to use the inner tent is to lie with your head closest to the mesh door. There’s a front vestibule that provides a large gear storage or cooking area in the front of the screen door. Unfortunately, the front vestibule door, does not open forward, but only to the side, which can make it difficult for occupants to exit at night without waking their tent partner.

The breathability of the solid inner tent is excellent and I haven’t had any internal condensation transfer from the outer fly to the inner tent on any of the trips I’ve taken. In addition to the big gap between the fly and inner tent, the bottom walls of the fly have catenary cuts (curves) that help channel air through the tent. The solid inner also has a deep bathtub floor, so there’s little risk of leakage if rain is blown under the tent’s sidewalls.

The interior of the tent is also quite comfortable, with steep walls and good head room. With a peak height of 39 inches you can sit up at the front of the tent and cook under the vestibule in inclement weather. While the floor narrows from 50″at the door to 43″ at the feet, you can fit two tapered 25″ wide sleeping pads side by side.

In warmer weather, you can roll the rear of the rain fly up over the pole sleeve to expose a screened mesh window at the rear of the inner tent. You can do the same with the front vestibule to expose the mesh screen door for maximum ventilation.

Front Vestibule

The Anjan 2’s front vestibule greatly expands the tent’s storage area and makes it possible to keep most of your loose gear under cover but outside of the living area. It also provides a sheltered and covered area to cook in rainy or windy weather, which is particularly important if you want to wait out a storm for more than one day.

But the vestibule’s single side entrance makes it awkward for a second parson sharing the tent to enter and exit because they need to reach across their companion to open the inner mesh door, before crawling through the vestibule to exit. The side exit also makes it difficult to avoid brushing up against the vestibule ceiling when the inside is wet with internal condensation.

As a point of comparison, the Hilleberg Nallo 2 has a better vestibule design that addresses most of these issues. It has an awning and dual bi-directional zippers so you can unzip the door from the top to create a transom for ventilation or from below to create a door. It’s still not perfect because stored gear can interfere with entry and exit, but it makes it easier for the second occupant to get in and out of the tent without having to crawl over their companion or brush up against the vestibule ceiling.

The Nallo is a heavier tent however (by close to 2 pounds) and designed for four season use. But the Anjan 2 would be more convenient for two people to use if its front vestibule had a similar design.

Complexity

The Anjan 2 is an “elaborate” tent in design and construction and there are a large number of variables that you may have to tweak when you pitch the tent to get a solid setup, such as pole tension, adding stakes for increased wind worthiness, guyline tensioning, rear and front ventilation, or connecting the inner tent. These can really add up during the tent set up process, particularly if you have to perform them in wind or rain.

Part of this complexity arrises from the tunnel tent shape and hoops you have to jump through to create a stable structure with reasonable storage and enough ventilation for two people. It also helps explain the popularity of dome-shaped single and dual vestibule tents, which offer many of the same benefits, but with a much simpler and more livable results. For example, the Hilleberg Niak and Hilleberg Rogen are two strong one-vestibule and two-vestibule domes that are simpler to set up than the Anjan 2, but provide similar weather worthiness, durability, and comfort.

Assessment

The Hilleberg Anjan 2 is a 2 person double-wall tent designed for three season use. Weighing 3 lbs 5 oz, it is made with highly waterproof, but lightweight fabrics, that have a high tear strength for increased durability. While it is a double-walled tent, the outer fly can also be pitched first in rain to prevent the inner tent from getting wet, a feature that is missing from the majority of tents made and sold by US tent manufacturers.

The Ajan 2 has a tunnel tent shape and front vestibule the provides covered storage space, a wind break, and a place to cook in inclement weather. However when used, it only has a side entrance, making it challenging for a second person to enter or exit without disturbing the first or getting wet if the interior of the vestibule is damp from condensation. While the vestibule is tolerable if you camp with an intimate partner, it’s not an ideal door design.

If you prefer the quality and durability of Hilleberg tents and want to stay in the “family”, I can recommend the Hilleberg Nallo 2, Hilleberg Niak, and Hilleberg Rogen two-person tents instead. These tunnel and dome tents share many of the same design attributes of the Anjan 2, but have better vestibules and are easier to use.

Disclosure: Hilleberg loaned a tent to the author for this review.

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