Have you made plans for the long weekend in May yet? If you’ re thinking of camping at Sir Winston Churchill Provincial Park, your opportunity to reserve a spot in the great outdoors is soon to come.
Have you made plans for the long weekend in May yet? If you’ re thinking of camping at Sir Winston Churchill Provincial Park, your opportunity to reserve a spot in the great outdoors is soon to come.
Alberta Parks’ online campsite reservation system will launch later this month. And while February might seem a little early for that, the system is designed to allow campsite bookings at a variety of provincial parks up to three months in advance.
That way, reservations for peak periods are fair and accessible to all who might be interested.
The online system dates from 2009 but it’ s found favour with campers of all stripes, as it allows for large group bookings and individual site reservations at parks across Alberta.
“What we’ ve found over the last several years is the system has gained in popularity,” said Tim Chamberlin, spokesperson for Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development, the ministry that oversees the Parks department.
In 2014, for example, there were 1,714 reservations made online for Sir Winston Churchill, which is Alberta’ s only provincial park on an island. Those bookings were for around 6,000 individual camper nights, Chamberlin says.
Online bookings for group sites will begin on Monday, Feb. 9, starting at 9 a.m. Regular individual campsites can be reserved the following Tuesday, Feb. 17, but a staggered approach will be adopted this year.
What that means is parks in different regions of the province will become available for online bookings of individual campsites at different times on that day. Reservations for Sir Winston Churchill and other parks in northern Alberta will be allowed starting at 5 p.m.
That’ s to prevent the website from being swamped by outdoor enthusiasts, as has happened in previous years, Chamberlin says.
“The volume was so high that it was affecting the system,” he said.
The staggered approach is only being used for regular campsite bookings, and only on Feb. 16.
For people who want the outdoors experience without having to sleep in a tent or a trailer, comfort camping opportunities in new, cabin-style accommodations will also be available for booking through the Internet. Sir Winston Churchill has five newly constructed cabins, located at the end of the causeway connecting the park to the mainland, which offer serene natural surroundings as well as all of the amenities of a home away from home.
The cabins were constructed last year, so 2015’ s will be their first full season of use.
To reserve a campsite using the online booking system, visit reserve.albertaparks.ca. You can also use Alberta Parks’ Call Centre, which will follow the same schedule for allowing reservations as the website, by calling 1-877-537-2757.
