Clothesline mod for drying stuff under the tarp without being directly over the hammock?

Not sure if I'm going to be able to explain this correctly or not but here goes....

I've been trying to come up with a way to hang stuff up to dry so that it would still be under the tarp but not directly over my hammock and dripping down onto it (wet socks, damp shirt, etc when it's still raining out). What I've come up with is putting a "clothesline mod" about halfway down the sides of a tarp. It would just be two loops sewn on the underside of the tarp about halfway down. Then you could just use some cordage between the two loops to create a line that runs parallel to the hammock that is not directly over the hammock.

I'm sure you wouldn't want to hang super heavy stuff on it like completely soaked pants but seems like it would be okay for the smaller stuff.

Thoughts?

If you DIY your own Tarp, you could incorporate the pullouts in that fashion under the tarp. I have made my own in the past and instead of joining the panels at the ridge, I would cut one in half and sew both halves to either side of the whole piece. This would give 2 seams on either side of the tarp to make your clothes line.

Some tarps - I'm thinking about the Universal by JRB - have a connection point on the inside so when you are not in the hammock, you can pull the hammock to the side of the tarp and keep the center free. If the tarp has exterior panel pulls, I could imagine running a line from one panel pull, around the edge of the tarp to the inside, down the length, around the other end, and tied to the other panel pull. The guying would keep the line, and garments there on, from pulling the tarp ends together. Inside connections are fine, but that's one more seam to seal.

Because I baby my tarps, if I needed something like this, I'd by a smaller section of waterproof fabric and make a "mini-tarp" that wouldn't need such a wide tree gap. I could run several lines, under the mini, between the two anchor points.

Sure, the top might drip a bit on the tier below it - but the other aspect is often the "drying power" of the wind. So you don't want the clothes to be too protected. You want the rain off but the wind on. You may not get that under your full tarp.

Nothing seems to dry much under my tarp overnight. Especially if it's raining. I figure on mornings that I also have condensation on the inside of my tarp that is also in my clothes if they are hanging up there. With the new materials in a lot of outdoor gear now days, once it stops raining and the sun comes out things dry very quickly. You can even walk some trail runners dry once you get them out of the muck.

My experience with waterproof boots is they are hot and once you do wet them out on a trip, they generally stay that way until you remove them from the environment and dry them out. I still use them in cold weather and snow, but have been an Altra fan for a year or so now.

A separate clothesline is probably a better answer.
Rig it up on some trail sticks or hiking poles. Make the clothesline long enough to be able to stake it out.
I carry a length of zing it that works like this. I can tie/clip it to the trees as a normal drying scenario, or if I needed (it never rains on me :lol:) rig it under the tarp.
I think if it was sewn into tarp somehow, it would sag or cause stress on the tarp.

I was not aware of the tarps like the Universal by JRB. I think I like the idea of just pulling the hammock to the side even better (more room to cook, change clothes, etc).
Thanks!

It's cool (the universal) but is that that much more difficult to just undo the Hammock - leaving the suspension up - and stuffing it, with the quilts still attached, in a big sack. I think that Universal also has an interior loop in the center of the ridgeline (check those seam seals) to support an interior "clothes line". If you use that, and it's raining, make sure your water blocks work so you don't give the rain a highway into your tarp.

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But back to the original thread - I think if you want the items to dry, you'll need the help of the wind and/or low humidity.

In Korea, in the winter, we'd hang our just washed clothes on the line. By morning they'd be stiff as boards. Our little room at the monastery was heated by smoke, from the kitchen cooking fires, flowing through concrete channels in the floor. So we'd lay the clothes down flat on the floor and they'd thaw out in no time. But in the summer, on Orcas Island, though much warmer, you could take off a wet, wetsuit, hang it on the line for 12 hours, and still have to crawl back into the dank wetsuit at 4 AM to catch the outgoing current. Had the wind been blowing during that "drying time", I'm sure that wetsuit would have felt much better.

A tarp with doors like a WB Superfly is easy enough to rig up a clothesline. I normally have the doors pulled back with shock cord and mitten hooks on the outside of the tarp. But see below, it's easy enough to reverse it so that it's connected from the inside of the tarp. But, I doubt anything would dry much by morning...nothing really dries overnight.

Hanging wet clothes off the pack while hiking works...just make sure it's secured well enough to avoid losing anything. However, laying stuff out in direct sun works best.

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