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Recreation.gov

recreation.gov

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Re: Recreation.gov

#101

Post by droidno9 »

sargram01 wrote: post #98

Has anyone ever been able to make a reservation on that site? Anytime I look at locations they’re either closed, or booked, or you have to plan a half year in advance.

The popular sites are booked within minutes of opening up. [Thus the complaints about bots.] That said, many of these sites have a limited number of spots reserved for walk-ins. So, have a couple of back up options if you're going to try your luck at a popular site.

Sites that don't have electric or water hookups may be easier to get since they're less popular with RVs. And the folks with RVs are experts at campsite reservation.

That said, go off the beaten path. Less people make for a more enjoyable experience. Some of my best car camping experiences have been on the side of a forest service road, especially one accessible only with a high clearance 4x4.

Sites that are accessible only by foot, even a half a mile in, are usually not that crowded. But you'd have to backpack in everything you'd need for the stay.

Re: Recreation.gov

#102

Post by bchanudet »

OrgNet wrote: post #36
xur17 wrote: post #2

Are the maps failing to load for anyone else?

The map doesnt load and it's missing many camping sites in my area

I think something is wrong with the map or some sites' coordinates, because some POI are in the Atlantic, west of Europe.

Also the Netherlands memorial is located in Belgium, but in the "How to get there" instructions it is said to be east of Maastricht.

Re: Recreation.gov

#103

Post by Dowwie »

I've used this site many times without any issues, which is all I can ask for from a government funded service. I've even had a good experience resolving a refund. The campground maps are valuable for booking tent camp sites. It helps to know where sites are relative to bathrooms and other common areas.

Re: Recreation.gov

#104

Post by almog »

droidno9 wrote: post #84

Front and center of any website to outdoor activities should include some education about Leave No Trace ( https://lnt.org/ ). It's an absolutely laudable effort to get more people outdoors. However, people new to the outdoors aren't very cognizant of the kind of footprint they leave behind, not to mention the *holes who intentionally throw trash at public parks like they're in their own backyards. For the former typ…

And for people who follow the LNT protocol, and perhaps even carry other people trash, the next step I suggest is to destroy bushcrafters' "shelters".

They disrupt soil, more often than not made out of live cut trees (and hinder wood decomposing when not) and 9 out of 10 times, will come with beer cans/tp scattered around and it's illegal to 'build' them on public land.

If you happen to see one, destroy it, you'll be doing well for the environment. In fact, USFS and NPS often do just that as part of their job.

Here is one guy who's work on that field inspires others: https://douchepacker.com/2018/07/09/destroying-buschcrafter-...

Re: Recreation.gov

#106

Post by lotsofpulp »

ben174 wrote: post #52
reagan83 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate? This sounds interesting...

I don’t think it was some crazy bot net trying to make money off camping slots. It’s simply a bunch of Silicon Valley nerds that figured out how to automate the booking system for the most desirable camping spots in the bay. But a few of them got greedy I think. Not sure why. One of my coworkers wrote a bot and shared it around the company. Not sure how far that bot spread but I’m sure other people did the same. And…

> The parks really should have had better defenses.

Requiring a deposit payment at time of booking is a pretty easy one. Make it non refundable if it continues to be a problem. Increase the price if it still is a problem.

If the goal then is to make it fair for everyone regardless of ability to afford it, require a legible scan of ID or passport and restrict each person to reserving 1 spot in the future at a time, and they must be the person stating in the camp site so someone has to verify their ID at the camp site too, otherwise they can now resell that reservation like ticket re-sellers.

I don’t see other options of “fairly” distributing something with limited quantities. Trying to do it on the technical side by trying to prevent automated scripts is a losing battle in the long run.

Re: Recreation.gov

#107

Post by drsim »

leggomylibro wrote: post #23

The NPS and BLM sites are also good resources for finding information about different areas and activities: https://www.nps.gov/findapark/index.htm https://www.blm.gov/programs/recreation/ As for campsite reservations, peak seasons will always be terribly crowded at major campsites. It's too bad that people are gaming the system, but if you need to rush to get a spot in line, you're probably not going to feel like yo…

Great point. We stayed at a lot of campsites in California a few summers ago and wrestled with the bookings.

In the end our favourite spot was a quiet campsite in Lassen Volcanic park.

Re: Recreation.gov

#108

Post by chrisweekly »

CaptainMarvel wrote: post #70
gitgud wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But don't kid yourself - that would not solve botting at all. Surely capatcha's and rate limiting raises the bar for people botting. It couldn't make it any worse right?

If it doesn’t make it any better, then captcha makes it works for real humans

works -> worse

Re: Recreation.gov

#109

Post by neurobashing »

bitexploder wrote: post #73
ben174 wrote: post #16

I worked in the bot defense space for quite some time, and it’s insane how much of the bot efforts were dedicated to getting camping spots. I’m happy to see this being recognized because I had many summers ruined because I couldn’t just get my old favorite camp spot.

In my experience many of the best camp sites I have been to have been in federal forest land on forest roads. The tougher the road the better (limits traffic). I have found some amazing places in Colorado that you could never reserve and they don’t exist as official camp sites. You find a good spot and you camp. Camp grounds with packed in sites are... good for some things. I acknowledge this is a problem for some hi…

Around here in the East it’s often called “dispersed camping”.

Re: Recreation.gov

#110

Post by [deleted] »

brailsafe wrote: post #93
ben174 wrote: post #16

I worked in the bot defense space for quite some time, and it’s insane how much of the bot efforts were dedicated to getting camping spots. I’m happy to see this being recognized because I had many summers ruined because I couldn’t just get my old favorite camp spot.

Hang on. Is this hyperbole or are you saying you've actually had not one, but multiple summers ruined just because you could get a particular spot? Seems like too rigid a definition of a summer to enjoy the very nature of summer.

[deleted]
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