The Lantern That Ended Midnight Flashlight Hunts at Camp

Somewhere around 2 a.m. on the second night of a long weekend, I found myself on my hands and knees in the sand, patting the floor of the tent for a flashlight one of the grandkids had knocked off the camp cot. I'm Sam Faleolo, 63, retired high school football coach from Kapolei, Oahu, and I've camped long enough to know that moment was my own fault. I'd packed a lantern that ran on batteries I forgot to bring, and the spare set was in the truck, a silver Toyota Tundra parked forty yards away. The next trip, I brought the Lepro 1000LM LED Camping Lantern, rechargeable with a 4400mAh battery and four light modes. That was three summers ago. I haven't done a midnight flashlight hunt since.

To be clear about how we camp: it's car camping, not backpacking. On a typical three-day weekend at a state or county beach park, I've got three to five grandkids, ages six to fifteen, plus whatever my grown kids can get off work. That means gear that sets up fast, survives being dragged across gravel, and keeps small humans happy after dark. The Lepro does all three. It's a compact lantern with a handle that flips up so you can hang it from the tent loop or a picnic table hook.

The first thing you notice is the light. Four modes: a warm low that's perfect for bedtime, a brighter warm mode for dinner, a cool bright mode when you're looking for a lost shoe, and a flashing mode we use to mark our site when the kids wander a few sites over. At full power it's rated 1000 lumens, which is overkill for a six-person tent, but I like having the range. You can dim it down and make the battery last. The low setting is the one we use most. It gives off just enough light for the kids to find their shoes without waking up the whole tent.

Charging is where this thing won me over. I plug it into the USB port in the truck while we're driving to the park, or into a small power bank I keep in the cooler bag. A full charge runs the lantern for a long weekend of evening use. I've forgotten to charge it once, and the 4400mAh battery still got us through two nights on the low setting. On a typical trip we're there from Friday afternoon to Sunday evening, so the lantern gets a full two nights of use and still has charge left when we pack up. That's the kind of margin I appreciate at my age.

The only light I pack for the tent now is the Lepro. One charge carries the whole weekend.

I'll also tell you what it's not. It's not a spotlight. If you need to light up a trail fifty yards out, bring a dedicated flashlight. The Lepro throws a wide, even glow that fills a campsite or a tent, and that's exactly what a lantern should do. I keep one in the tent for the kids and one on the picnic table for card games.

Honest cons? The switch is a push button on the top, and little fingers can find it in the dark. That's not a big deal. The bigger one is that it needs a USB source to charge, so if you're the kind of camper who goes deep into the backcountry with no vehicle, you'll want a solar panel or extra power bank. For what we do, beach parks and county campgrounds with the Tundra parked nearby, it's a non-issue.

The other thing I like is how it takes a beating. I've watched a six-year-old knock it off a table onto packed gravel. It's got scuffs now. It still works. The handle is solid, the lens is scratched but not cracked, and the button still clicks the way it should. For gear that lives in a tote bin between trips, that matters.

On the last trip, my daughter texted me from her tent at 11 p.m. to ask where the lantern was. I told her it was hanging on the hook right above her head. She said, 'Oh. Right.' That's the whole review in one exchange. You stop thinking about the light when it's doing its job.

I've had mine for three summers now, which is long enough to know what breaks on camping gear and what doesn't. The rubber cap over the USB port is still snug, the battery still holds a charge, and the modes still cycle the way they did on day one. My oldest grandson asked if he could borrow it for a school camping trip. I told him he could, but only if he brought it back charged. He did. That's why I tell the younger dads at the field to stop buying disposable lanterns and get one rechargeable that'll still be in the gear bin when their kids are old enough to drive.

What I'd Tell You If We Were Sitting at My Kitchen Table

Here's the plain version, coach to coach. If you camp with kids, you need a lantern you can hang, charge from your car, and forget about until the sun goes down. The Lepro does that without drama. It's not the cheapest light on the shelf and it's not the most rugged thing you can buy, but for a family that camps out of a pickup, it's the one I'd buy again. I've recommended it to three other families on our camping loop, and two of them have already ordered their own. Pack it, charge it on the drive, hang it up when you get there, and save the flashlight for the emergency kit where it belongs.