Ah, the long weekend is almost upon us. There is no fire ban (yet) and the wilderness beckons.
Who doesn’t love camping? I have loved it since I was a kid, since my parents were big campers. My father made the best camp potatoes over an open fire I have ever tasted to this day — secret ingredient, bacon.
My mother — the organized one — had a list of camping necessities which she laminated and presented to me when I left home.
Now our family weren’t tent campers. They liked the comfort of a trailer or later, a motorhome.
However, Mom still turned her nose up at the all services, full hook up sites for RVs.
The best spots, in her mind, were the unserviced ones, the ones closer to the woods. Services were not required. We’re camping.
In keeping with that theme, although our trailers had stoves inside, they were not used. We’re camping, use the campfire.
It’s a lesson I absorbed, and I have never stayed in a full hook up site. Nor have I cooked inside a trailer. Use the campfire. Or at the very least, a Coleman stove.
Raining? That’s what tarps are for.
After leaving home, camping continued, but it was back to tents.
We often referred to our trips as ‘camping with the Clampets’, because by the time the tarps were strung, the refreshments were served, the groceries spread all over the picnic table and the fire started, we did look a little like a backwoods homestead. All we needed was a still to make our own moonshine.
I always greatly admired the campers who kept their sites pristine, nothing out of place, nothing messy. No matter how I tried I just couldn’t keep my site clutter free. I mean we put everything away at night because… bears. But during the day it was a free for all.
Now back then, you rarely had difficulty getting a camping spot. We often drove across the country and would pull into a provincial park at night with no reservations. Always got a campsite.
That would not happen now. Now, you pretty much have to reserve. Or head out to a rec site on a Wednesday, pay the extra days and go back to your trailer on Friday for the weekend.
B.C.s parks are full every weekend, busting at the seams with outdoors enthusiasts.
In fact Joffre Lakes Provincial Park near Pemberton, which is one of the busiest in the province, is undertaking a plan for crowd control.
B.C. Parks says number of visitors to Joffre Lakes has soared 168 per cent in the last nine years. Around 183,000 people visited the park last year, which works out out to an average of more than 500 people every day.
Apparently the hike up to the Park’s main attraction — three blue green lakes surrounded by glacier-clad mountains — is so popular now that you will never have a moment alone on the trails. The parking lots are always full and you will now be towed if you park on the highway. Dogs have been banned and reservations for campsites are mandatory.
This does not sound like the camping I remember.
And it’s everywhere. We may have more space here in the Kootenays, but try even getting to the lakeshore at Premier Lake on a hot August day. Try getting a spot along the lake at Koocanusa without getting into fistfight because you’re on somebody’s pre-claimed territory.
I mean where do you have to go to get a little privacy, Mt. Everest? I kid. Mt. Everest is more crowded than Joffre Lake Provincial Park these days.
If you want to be alone for the long weekend, you’d be well advised to stay in town. The deer figured it out a long time ago. It’s nice and quiet in town. Everyone else is camping.