The Rocky Mountains run down the whole length of North America, practically joining up with the Andes in South America. They have long been a source of delight for me, growing up camping in and through them from ages 14-22 and, in 1989, mountain biking with a friend from Jasper to Banff and then west all the way to the Pacific. Unforgettable.
Family and I recently spent our traditional first camp of the year at Snaring River campground, near Jasper. This was the May long weekend, including Victoria Day. Several people went out a couple of days early to reserve spots (which, there, can’t be booked except in person), and the rest of us followed on Friday, leaving Monday.
The road itself is a big difference. In the Rockies, you’re mostly driving on the flat, with mountains all around you. In Georgia you seem always to be steeply ascending or descending, among the mountains in a much more intimate way, though the roads range from equally as good as Canadian ones to “rated among worst in world,” as those in Tusheti (I’ve survived that gorgeous place three times now, but always with the same experienced professional driver, because my wife won’t have it any other way).
Camping in North American is a fine art, with many designated locations outside or inside provincial and national parks. The pastime ranges from hiking with all your gear on your back, through driving or biking with a tent or hammock, to SUV-top tents to camper vans to truck-mounted campers or pulled tent trailers, and motor homes many meters long. There is a whole industry built around camping, supplying all sorts of equipment for it to suit any budget.
Georgia has hardly any formally designated campgrounds… although this means hugely more freedom for enthusiasts simply to arrive and set up, asking permission and/or paying a small fee if required. In Canada, there are strict rules about number of vehicles and tents in a formal site, fire location (ONLY in the designated fire area), and even picking up of any loose wood to burn (DON’T! Use only the provided split wood, nothing else!). This is a change from the years when we would pull up to our location and my little sister and I, aged 8-16, would be sent off to gather all the available fallen dry wood to burn. No more of that now. This strictness is both to allow wildlife to benefit from nature, and to limit forest fires, which only last year ravaged Jasper town itself and its surroundings, to the shock of the world.
Canadian campsite prices are much higher too, of course, because you’re paying to support careful infrastructure for millions of campers per year and the parks themselves. Look at $30/day or more. You may or may not have an on-site water and electricity source and sewage outlet for your camper too. Failing these, there will be outhouse toilets, bear-proof thick steel garbage dumpsters, a common water source, and the requirement to pump out your camper’s sewage off-site somewhere. So, varying degrees of comfort and support.
We usually went in tents, with two canoes as well, and a whole minutely detailed paper checklist of what to take for every camp. Nothing left out, from matches to gauze dining tent against the prevalent mosquitoes (which are virtually nonexistent in Georgia’s mountains).
Wildlife is completely protected, with harsh penalties for harming or killing it. Here, you may see bears (others of my family did on this trip, but I didn’t), beavers (seen by no one save a flash of a head examining me before it dove into the water, but evident by their huge log lodges), Canada Geese, loons, raptors, various ducks, songbirds, woodpeckers… and bighorn sheep, which we saw in abundance right at the roadside. You are strongly warned not to approach or feed any wildlife, both for its own sake and yours. But a new word has been coined to describe those who break these rules, and usually end up injured or dead at the horns or claws of bison or bear: tour (or tourist) morons. Apt. YouTube is full of their idiotic exploits, and they seemingly never will learn. I’m sure my Georgian friends are envious at the sight of the four well-decorated old bighorn rams I saw together… but they’re not to be shot! Just admired. Or it’s off to prison for you.
As I mentioned in last week’s article comparing Georgian and Canadian wetlands, garbage in mountains and campsites is a huge difference. Almost none in Canada; far too much in Georgia. We need to work on this, and I think we are.
Blog by Tony Hanmer
Tony Hanmer has lived in Georgia since 1999, in Svaneti since 2007, and been a weekly writer and photographer for GT since early 2011. He runs the “Svaneti Renaissance” Facebook group, now with over 2000 members, at www.facebook.com/groups/SvanetiRenaissance/
He and his wife also run their own guest house in Etseri: www.facebook.com/hanmer.house.svaneti
