In the summer, before the weekend, all the roads are clogged with steep and, once such, trailers, pickups with tents, boats, bicycles, jet skis and other camping staff. But you can even easily see a small car with a large kayak on top, expertly tied with belts. Happy children and similar dogs in the windows. Thousands of cars. A movie picture that came to life. But, it is noteworthy that no one can just put up a tent in any beautiful place. This is illegal. Camping is a business organized by the state. This is supported by a budget equal to the finances of an African country.
For this purpose, Canada has a large number of national parks with specially equipped paid recreation areas. Many are booked half a year in advance and are sorted out in seconds of opening. Stunning nature, lakes are hard to distinguish from the sea. In the parks, in addition to the sites themselves, there is security, cleaning, toilets, a shop, maps and maps of driveways to all the beauties, often showers, laundry rooms.
- Why Canadians love camping
Camping has a special place among the attractions and entertainment of Canada. This is not only a popular form of recreation, but, perhaps, a kind of symbol of Canada along with maple leaf, syrup, hockey, etc. Many people come to Canada in order to go camping. And if it initially seems strange for someone to fly thousands of kilometers away to live in the forest, you will be surprised: camping among Canadians is a special, “national” occasion, a type of recreation. Even without it, impressions of Canada are clearly lame.
Hiking is incredibly popular in the country, as it is free, and the most popular form of accommodation is camping. For camping places are often slaughterhouses, they are dismantled like hot cakes and what kind of life hacks do not make that take places. Sometimes, on the day of availability of dates, they specifically take months in advance to provide themselves with places for the weekend (2-3 nights), and some programmers even write scripts to automatically select places as they become available.
That’s how Canadians become camping fanatics.
A special flavor of Canadian camping is given by the fact that nature in Canada is full, beautiful, pristine, untouched, protected, and the population is small (the smallest density in the world). But people still want to go to nature, not in order to be alone (since there are a lot of campers in campsites), but to live and relax (not in our understanding) in nature.
Camping in Canada is divided into two types: frontcountry (when you drive up to a specially equipped place by car, usually with a table and a place to build a fire and you only have to put up a tent) and backcountry (when you go hiking and put the tent where you see fit. Both in the first and second cases, you need to book ready-made camping sites in advance).
So, imagine Canada – the second largest country after Russia, where the vast majority of the population is concentrated 240 km from the US border, and the rest of the territory is occupied by lakes, rivers, forests, parks, there is even a desert, in a word – nature. There are a total of 43 parks (national, provincial , etc.), which cover 2.2% of the total area of Canada. That is, there is a lot of nature to visit, too. But there are also a lot of people who want to do this.
- When to book a camping spot in Canada
Book a good camping spot in the parks can be almost six months in advance. Places sell out quickly. That is, if you want to live in some beautiful place, so that there is not only a forest, a lake / river, a beautiful shore, rocks, etc.and that it is not far from Toronto, for example, then you need to take care of this in advance.
Book-means to buy a small clearing in the forest, where you can park a car or two, a tent or tents, which has a place for a fire, a table with benches. Such a place costs 30-40 dollars per day, if with electricity supply, then it is more expensive. There will be a lot of similar clearings nearby – on the right, on the left, across the road.
So, if you go for privacy, specifically, then this is not quite it. Canadians go camping during the entire period when camping sites are open, and this is somewhere from May to October (well, so that the snow does not drift) on vacation and on any weekend.
- Tips before packing for a camping trip
When camping, take with you everything you need to live in the forest, and not only in the forest, but also on the lake: for example, canoes and fishing gear. Along the way, you will meet not only the Canadian beauty of nature, but also a string of cars with the same canoes, boats and other floating vessels, clearly striving in the same direction . The closer you get to your destination, the more often you will see all possible warning signs with animals-deer, elk, and even turtles. There are a lot of them in parks, and they can go out on the road.
So, at the entrance to the campsite, they issue a map and offer to buy firewood, you can bring it with you. Yes, yes, despite the fact that in parks, as in any overgrown forest, and parks look exactly like this, there is a lot of wood, it is strictly forbidden to collect sticks for a fire. Periodically, there is a patrol that looks out for unauthorized firewood and fines large fines. Neither cut down, as is done here, nor collect dry branches is prohibited.
Camping rules in Canada may vary from place to place, but there are general rules that prevail in most places. As already mentioned, it is forbidden to collect / chop firewood, catch fish of the wrong size/grade. For this, you can pay heavy fines or even pay with a car. It is forbidden to listen loudly to music (even in the daytime) and generally make noise, because people go to enjoy nature. Many places prohibit the use of alcohol. Not all campsites are pet-friendly.
The campsite looks like this : a large overgrown forest with many playgrounds, where the furniture consists of a wooden table with a bench and a place for a fire. Bring everything else with you – tents, sleeping bags, cauldrons, firewood, food, etc. To the right, to the left, behind, across the clearing are the same vacationers.
Separately about toilets. Campsites have normal civil toilets with flushing, showers, and even washing machines.
- What do you do at a Canadian camping site?
During the day, they prepare food, lie in hammocks, walk in the woods, swim, sunbathe, ride bicycles, canoes and other vessels, catch fish. What they don’t do: don’t play music, don’t yell, don’t get drunk. Well, they do not get acquainted, although the neighbors, as they say, are at arm’s length, well, not an arm’s length, but a leg’s length so exactly.
What do you do at the campsite in the evening? They build bonfires, cook food, and communicate. Yes, they also go back and forth with flashlights on their heads, some to the toilet, some to the shower. This is an interesting sight: in total darkness, a lot of glowing lanterns on people’s heads. And at 11 pm there is complete silence, it is forbidden to make noise under the gun of the patrol.
How else to spend time: during the day, swim in the lake, ride on the river, try to fish, fry all sorts of goodies, and in the evening, more precisely, at night, look at the starry sky. It’s amazing in Canada! Such placers of stars and such a large number of them you will rarely see in the world. In Canada, the sky is special. And in the morning, at five in the morning, you will be lucky enough to meet the dawn on the lake. The sun shaking off the water, the mist floating on the very edge, the sound of water running down from the monotonously rising oars, how can you forget it? This is a must-try when traveling in Canada.
