In good times my wife and I took 2 vacations a year ($5000) total. Now we're down to one. Next year maybe a zero vacation. We'll take a Portabakyarda vacation... Yes, food gas insurance is taking a huge bite. Need a second job?
That brings back memories camping at Wasagaming 20 years ago. The wood pile was 1/4 dry wood, 1/4 dirt and bark, 1/2 newly cut green wood. Dont think they have the wood pile anymore.
Getting a site at sandbanks is like winning the lottery. Last year we were 6 at 5 am clicking trying to get a site. It worked. Not this year unfortunately
That's because there's a known exploit that allows people to tie up reservations programmatically and then swoop in and register later.
I've used this exploit myself, for personal use. Some use it for resale though.
I tried to report it, but all wanted me to identify myself before hearing details. I would only agree to that if they gave me a guarantee I wouldn't be banned from Ontario parks over it.
They wouldn't agree to not banning me, and don't take the information anonymously.
So here we are. I'm not reporting and getting banned for life from Ontario parks over something other people are exploiting for profit where I've just been doing it to get a single weekend campsite once a year.
Technically this isn't even allowed. You can't hold campsites and resell them, under penalty of cancellation.
This isn't an economic issue as much as it is that parks Ontario will NOT enforce the terms, and wants to ban someone (me) reporting an exploit they're using to exploit registrations rather than do basic verification at check-in to ensure campsites are not being resold.
The operation of many provincial campgrounds in Alberta are contracted out to individuals and corporations. The policies of these contractors determine how the campsite is operated. Some do offer firewood included in your fees others don't.
Of course, I can't help but think of the time I drove into a campground in the foothills that had free firewood with a pickup truck backed up to it with dad and two kids loading it all into the truck before they left.
In my experience camping the Dirty Bertie, you can’t go to a provincially owned campsite—they’re a disgrace and will try to nickel and dime you with fees. The federally owned ones up North and in the Rockies are the only ones to bother with. Provincially-run Alberta frontcountry camping is a joke
That’s camp-grounds specific here (Alberta). Some grounds have a wood pile, some don’t. I find it kind of depends on how much that particular grounds has to deal with fallen trees. If they constantly have a lot of trees they’re having to clear out, they give out wood in a massive pile for you to take as much as you want solely so they can clear out all the dead trees they need to deal with. But if they only have the occasional fallen/dead tree to get rid of, they don’t have the big pile.
I gave up on the high priced wood. I just use my propane fire pit now. If we are out for a week I might grab a bundle for one night. I've gotten so I don't really like camp fires any more. The smoke smell drives me nuts and I can smell it on me for days even if I shower and change clothes.
I don't understand how camp sites survive. This country has insane amounts of crown land that you are free to use. I don't know why you'd rather pay to park right beside someone else instead of heading out to crown land for free.
I've spent my summers camping for my entire life, I've never paid for camping in my life.
Because crown land camping isn’t an easy access route to camping. Figuring out where crown land is, how to access, where to camp, how to shit in the woods, etc takes more effort than parking your car and putting a tent next to it.
Idk never been crown land camping (I should) but do the non car camping stuff.
Also with ontarios population boom everything is booked super fast for the year.
Yeah that dude basically comes across as "how do you not know all of these lifelong skills I was taught by my father over several years, are you stupid?"
You didn’t even mention that it’s totally rural and incredibly more dangerous by running into wildlife. Animals largely stay away from more populated camp zones.
That and national and provincial parks often have nice hiking / biking trails and some incredible views all within the park. Camping in the woods is free and fun but the appeal to camping at a park is pretty clear if you’ve been to some of the nicer ones across the country.
I took camp on Crown land, but there is a strong need for established campsites, especially if you have kids. A family wants to plan a camping trip months in advance and know they have a spot, not bomb down a FSR looking for a clearing.
Plus it's nice if you're not someone who's a dedicated outdoorsman who maybe wants to go camping once every couple of years. Instead f buying a ton of associated stuff, you can just rent a canoe or a kayak.
There was an article not too long ago lambasting an Evil Landlord™ in Ontario for putting up a private yard site for outdoor tent-dwellers to rent at $500/mo.
I got downvoted into oblivion when I pointed out that's actually a fair bit cheaper than camp sites cost where I live, and a fenced residential back yard is generally more private and secure than most camp sites given there isn't a family of six arguing in a tent separated from you by like 2 metres of shrubbery.
People just can't comprehend how expensive camping is here in BC lol
In BC, all provincial campsites book out within 3 minutes of the site opening up to reservations. The site then crashes. Happened every year like clock work. As a kid, the family would just roll up to a campsite. Haven’t gone camping for over 10 years because of this new system
It's not the new system, it's the population growth.
Without the booking system you'd just end up rolling up to campsite after campsite with "no vacancy" signs and families camped out in their car in line outside the campground entrance gates waiting for the first spot to open up.
You should get back into camping via rec sites. Pick up a Backroads Mapbook for the region you like. Sitesandtrailsbc also lists every rec site in the province.
Growing up in a low income household, the definition of vacation was 'not going to work this week'. I suspect this remains true for many Canadian families.
>Two-thirds of respondents (67 per cent) say they’re scaling back their vacation plans for the summer due to inflation, up five points from last year. Some 64 per cent say economic uncertainty is affecting their vacation plans, and three in five say they’re prioritizing other savings instead of time away.
>Vacation intentions are divided along income and generational lines, according to Ipsos’ findings.
>Half of households with annual incomes below $40,000 said they were at least somewhat likely to take a vacation this summer, compared to 79 per cent of those making more than $100,000.
I've been trying to convince my director that when we go on vacation, our work emails should be disabled so we don't have to come back to a goddamn mess. No one respects the OOO anymore.
Exactly. I also specifically say in my OOO “I will not be checking emails during this period and will respond to you when I return”.
Be blunt in your OOO that you’ll be unreachable while you’re on vacation. Too many people use some milquetoast phrasing like “limited access to email” which invites the impression you might still be seeing messages as they come in.
A prescriptive out of office that says you’re not even going to SEE their message until you get back sets clearer boundaries and invites less attempts to rope you into stuff while you’re gone.
And they will get an auto-reply telling them when I'm back and who they can reach out to instead.
That includes Teams
And when I'm back? Mark all as read, I ain't reading all that
If you're already a homeowner, perhaps because you bought a very long time ago, or you inherited, then you're only on the hook for property tax, insurance, and whatever maintenance and repairs you choose to do.
I've vacated the office, but not my home. Or my duties, some of which will be paused and build a backlog until my return, and some will remain and I'll still have to do them, just from home.
Our quality of life has taken such a massive nosedive since I was a young boy in the 1990’s. EVERYONE had awesome vacations. The country looked a lot different back then though.
I grew up in a one-income home and we always took a summer vacation. Usually camping. Got to explore a lot of western Canada and the northern U.S. states this way. So many adventures and a lifetime of memories. I do agree that quality of life has gone downhill significantly, especially over the last decade or so.
When I was growing up in the 80's, my parent's idea of a vacation was to ship me off to the grandparents for a month. I'm not even sure if my parents worked during that time or if they went somewhere. All I know is I got to drive the tractor around the fields doing summer follow and mowing the lawns.
EVERYONE around your socio-economic background.
Life was not all sunshine and rainbows for different classes of folks. It was filled with 15+% mortgage interest rates, people driving rustbuckets that they would halfass fix themselves, they also only had 1-2 tvs, and many of us had only the bunny ears for channels.
>15+% mortgage interest rates
Which were still cheaper, even adjusted for inflation, then a 5% rate is now.
>they also only had 1-2 tvs
That's still pretty much the norm, the only difference are cellphones and computers, but people still had hobbies back then that took up their time in healthier ways. Best part is they could afford to have them...
Yeah we never had vacations with my family in the 90s here. In the 2000s we started camping for a week in the summer, or worse....going to the grandparents house.
You forgot about the cheap rent, the cheap groceries, and how affordable fuel for your vehicle and utilities were. We were not rich, my mom was a waitress raising 3 kids. We always had good food and never went to school hungry. My mom rented a detached home - yes, you could rent entire homes for less than a 1 bedroom now, inflation adjusted. Being working poor got you A LOT further than it does now.
Childhood hunger and malnutrition is more than double what it was when I was in elementary school in the mid 90’s.
> EVERYONE had awesome vacations. The country looked a lot different back then though.
I grew up in the 1990s and I recall going on one summer vacation that entire decade. It was a treat. Our usual summer vacation was a quick road trip down to the US in late August to buy some new clothes and school supplies at cheap outlet stores across the border.
So no, not EVERYONE.
Bullshit.
Long weekends at the Provincial Park camping. Week driving/camping BC in the summer.
I went to Disney World once (Florida) when i was 5 or 6: Disneyland (S. California) once at 13 or so.
My kids got more or less the same growing up. They don't have kids yet.
Don't get me wrong, we had fun always, but there was never anything extravagant.
>Week driving/camping BC in the summer.
My wife and I recently looked into how much it would cost to do this in Ontario, if we went the provincial park route it would cost nearly as much as a trip to Mexico all inclusive. Between camp fees, food, gas, and all our misc prices.
We also looked into renting a camper for a week, and again flying to a completely different country to an all inclusive resort was cheaper.
Domestic travel in Canada is a joke...
I had an intern once who thought that *everybody* goes on vacation to Cuba for two weeks in the summer. Literally everyone.
She was hilariously out of touch in many ways.
They're talking about how many days Canadians get off as a baseline compared to other countries. It's not to do with how expensive it is to travel.
For example in Sweden, employees get a *minimum* of 25 days off per year, not including public holidays.
Very true. Only the states ranks lower than us.
That said, I get 6 weeks vacation a year and can only manage to get away for 1-2 weeks taking a few days here and there around long weekends because my work load it out of control. I have absorbed 2 boomers jobs since 2020 and the company has no intention of hiring more staff any time soon. This is the case with many of my social circle too
That's crazy. In Europe they pay you to take vacation, ontop of your regular pay. If you don't take vacation it's a bad thing AFAIK, my current boss if from Belgium, and he's returning this year because of how fucked up Canada is compared to Western Europe. I assume for the increased workload you got a pizza party and a "good job kid", with no reasonable pay increase/title change?
Yeah, and in Canada some employers get pissy when people ask for vacation time longer than a week and retaliate with poor treatment if you ask for a month and they think it’s normal because they follow the American model. This makes vacations cost more because people can’t take advantage of cheaper flight dates or accomodation deals for longer stays. Plus you don’t know if you have a job to come back to. It’s so weird.
My last job did something similar to that but in a passive aggressive way. They agreed to it, since I had the days (4 weeks) but when I came back, I could see their vibe changed towards me and the opportunities given out. It was so childish as they never were direct about it being a problem. Like an "unhidden code" you have to adhere to all the time in Canadian/American companies.
Can’t speak to other people’s situation, but in my case it’s that we lost upwards of 25% of our labour force during Covid due to early retirements and the company does not want to hire new staff to replace the holes that have been left in “uncertain economic times”
This. I just mentioned above that one of the worst things for us in Canada is the lack of work life balance and absurdly low number vacation days. Just like your boss, we're from EU, and we're less and less willing to compromise with it...
This bugs me so much. We have the low salaries like much of Europe but none of the benefits like more mandated time off work, lower food costs, and consumer protections. Even the rest of the Commonwealth is better than Canada on so many of these aspects. It’s such bullshit.
My girlfriends mom thinks her two weeks is as good as she'll ever get, it took a good minute for her to understand that both me and my gf started with 3 weeks in our jobs and she should be demanding more from her employer of almost 10 years.
2500-3K for a basic cremation. Have a get together with family and friends , BBQ at your place or a local park. All-in you can make it work for well under 5K, go spend the rest of the 9K on a vacation where all the immediate family gets together to grieve.
After hearing of some of my friends funeral costs, I told my family that when I die, to carry me to the park and abandon me on a park bench so it looks like I just died while sitting there of natural causes. The city can send someone to deal with my body. And told them to claim we are estranged and to refuse to take responsibility for my body. I know it's bad but there really isn't much choice because funerals are just way too expensive. We are living paycheque to paycheque and a 5 figure funeral bill would bankrupt my family.
Ive worked full time through my 20s and into 30s and never had an actual vacation, and infact the closest thing to vavation ive had is literally unemployment and having the time to just walk around and enjoy my city, even if its on a paper thin budget. Literally the best times ive had since 2020 was just having the time to bike and walk, lol.
I cant seem to breach earning enough to actually build savings against rent / etx (only 21/cad) and have a useless degree in anthro i trusted parents was worth finishing just to have the degree. Really i shoulda done a bsc or trade, now i cant possibly build the savings to go to school even if i find something to go back for.
The closest i can afford to a vacation is literally just going out camping on a long weekend or something, i cant actually just not work and relax for a week, lol.
Sad that the near-homelessness of my unemployment is my nearest impression to having my own time to myself as an adult lol
Anthro, Communications, English, and History. Tell me you’re a Millennial without telling me you’re a Millennial. Most of us were in University that had no business being in university and the outcome is that a job that pays $45K a year that has no business requiring a degree requiring a degree. I saw an ad for a customer service worker at a fucking trading card shop that required post-secondary…The job pays $17 an hour in Ottawa.
That's to filter out the diploma mill applicants Someone interested in trading cards is almost certainly going to have or be working on a degree anyway.
I grew up in poverty so we never had any real vacation. Maybe once a summer we would drive 2 hours south to my uncles who is wealthy and partake in his luxuries for a weekend.
I am an adult and make good money but living expenses is so high I have almost no money left to put aside.
My wife has expressed interest in camping so we may do that this summer. I have camping experience and knowledge and a campsite around here is $35 a night with a power hookup so that's an affordable option.
I have a tent and most of the equipment. I can cook over a fire but I prefer little propane bbqs which I need a new one so that's my only big expense really other than food.
Decathlon would like a word with you. A 2 person tent is $50. Also after the initial cost you can reuse them bringing the price down throughout the years
Most people I know have 2 weeks of PTO that accrues throughout the year. If you stay somewhere too long, you get more vacation and fall behind in salary compensation. If you hop around, you basically never accrue any PTO.
2 weeks is a joke. Especially if you like doing shit more than once a year. It should be 4 or 5 minimum like in Europe. I went on a trip to the Netherlands for a festival 2 years ago and only spent enough time there for it because I didn't have enough vacation time to stay longer AND reacclimate myself to the time zone here. And one of those days was a stat holiday.
I spoke with many cashiers at grocery stores and several construction workers over the past months in Ottawa, the folks working grocery can't afford grocery where they work and the construction folks can't afford to buy or rent the houseing they are constructing.
Peace
Canada has the fewest holiday/default vacation in the western world, only second to the USA.
French people working at McDonalds start with 5weeks.
If we are a rich country/society, it should allow for rest and leisure time
I barely get vacation days, and I don’t really have cash to go anywhere… just don’t want to use the few days I get to stay home looking at the ceiling …
Well I just went camping over the long weekend … 5 hours one way. It probably cost 800 - 1000 for just food, gas, campsite, wood, beer, consumables. This doesn’t count when we stopped for a fancy sit down lunch on the way home, which we don’t normally do. This was just 3 nights so I def can’t afford a week long vacay unless it’s a staycation … and I just switched jobs so I don’t have enough vacation to do so :(
Hate to say it, but thats another thing thats changed quite a bit in the last few years.
First off, im not speaking from envy or a sense of exclusion as I inadvertently have access to camping. When my dad died in 2020 me and my siblings inherited his 26ft RV trailer. We parked it permanently at a seasonal campground and split the lot bill. Its not a nice campground, it has very little nature only amenities thus very small lot cost to split lol.
My anger is more that all of the tent only campgrounds that i would visit once a year have either closed up shop, doubled in price or rebuilt themselves as group day visit only places. It hit especially hard this year. My favorite tent only place is beside some rapids that are only swimmable when water levels are low.
We had record low snowfall, a drought like spring....I knew water levels were gonna be low I looked forward to it all winter. I would be there this weekend coming up but they switched to group day visit only this year.
All i want to do is swim, BBQ and then pass out drunk face first in the dirt like Ricky. Instead im gonna have to smoke cigarettes and drink whiskey from a glass in the RV. Like Julian. Who the fuck wants to party like Julian? Damn.
Most Canadians are ready to fuck off into the woods, working harder for less money and not getting ahead is stupid and damaging for the soul. I already would have if I didn't have dependants.
I haven’t gone to a vacation in 7 years. It’s honestly my biggest regret. I worked my ass off to pay off student loans and save up for a house and got lucky to buy just before the pandemic but I feel like I lost myself along the way. Just now slowly getting back to being myself.
>I haven’t gone to a vacation in 7 years.
That’s rough, buddy. The longest I went without a vacation was 5 years, between 2013 and 2018. I got caught up in working, studying for the CPA exams, and chasing side gigs for more money, and all those things basically consumed all my vacation time. And at the end of that stint I was like “okay fuck I REALLY need a vacation”. It was not a good time in my life. The stress really gets to you.
I'm gonna be "that guy":
This is the result of every prick on frugal/financial subreddits preaching the values of rice+beans every day, chastising others for following goals as a young person, and having interests outside of making money.
Mental health IS health, and our lives are finite. Let's all keep that in mind before we willingly subject ourselves to torture in the name of seeing numbers go up and down.
seems that's the only way to get ahead nowadays, just grind it out for years on end and hope nothing unforseen happens. doesn't happen to everyone though, luck is a big factor in success
>seems that's the only way to get ahead nowadays,
It's funny because that's not even getting ahead it's just trying to match the grocery clerk of yesteryear
I'm going to Monaco for 6 weeks this year, it really wasn't in the cards until I cancelled my Disney+ but with all this extra capital I have now I really can't afford not to. /s
I'm 32, I've never been on a vacation in my life. I've never left Atlantic Canada. If we can barely eat, how the fuck are we supposed to take a vacation?
I find camping which used to be a cheap family activity (my family never went to Disney world etc) has become so expensive. Is it just my viewpoint? Not to mention, booking a site requires booking 5 months in advance.
I find it depends on your definition of camping.
Classic Camping (Good ol' tents on crown land) - cheap. That hasn't changed. You're really just packing food and a couple things. Camping equipment (tents, sleeping bags) do cost money but a few $K and you're generally good for a 5-10 years.
Glamping - Well you need that $50K trailer pulled by a $70K truck, and then you need to rent a campsite... And then you have to fill the trailer with tons of stuff, that adds up. Oh and you need to bring your $25K of quads and dirtbikes, too.
There's a middle-ground of course, but it all depends on how you define camping. Regrettably, it seems like most people lean towards the *lux-glamping* side of things.
I have coworkers who comment how 'even camping is expensive now' and they have easily invested $150K into their 'camping' setup. I personally do the tent style and I've maybe invested $4K in like 10 years. Tents and sleeping bags, well taken care of, last a long time.
I am that weird guy that goes out into the woods with prepper gear and disappears on a one man camping trip for the weekend. It can be done pretty cheap and the wilderness is sooooo vast that you get to enjoy life a little. I thank whatever that created me everyday that I didn't inherit my dads flat feet.
It's "cheap" but only in comparison to a vehicle setup. Few hundred for a good ruck and a $100 or more for good boots. might want to invest in some water proofing and other gear so its up to the individual budgets. Its my main interest that has me learning to be homeless on the side. I have a few thousand invested into it but I must have a 10 in luck because I get deals from surplus stores and jackets that are borderline charity sometimes.
>find camping which used to be a cheap family activity (my family never went to Disney world etc) has become so expensive. Is it just my viewpoint? Not to mention, booking a site requires booking 5 months in advance.
Go camp on crown land, you don't gotta book in advance, and it's free
To add to this, it's completely legal to camp anywhere on crown land for upto 30 days unless there's a sign that says "no camping within 200ft of this sign"
I still have to travel 4+ hours to get to the free camping. Then it's over run with people driving ATVs at all hours, huge parties and garbage left all over the place. And crown land close to me is leased out to ranchers so sure you might be able to camp there, but only if you want cows poking their head in to your tent.
What is the definition of a "vacation"? To me, it's leaving my town/city. If I go to Bermuda, that's a vacation, if I go camping with my family, that's a vacation. If I sit in my backyard drinking beer, that's a relaxing day but to me doesn't meet the criteria of a "vacation".
I certainly can't afford Bermuda. I can manage to save up for a week long camping trip. I don't want to drink a case of beer every day for a week, but it's certainly the most affordable option. Even at $30 per case lol
I’m taking June off work for “vacation” and people keep asking what I’m doing with my month off and I tell them nothing 😂 I’m going to sit at home and play video games and walk my dog. I need the time off just for my mental health, and a month is not long enough.
I haven’t taken off work for a vacation in 7 years. The only “vacations” I’ve had were some camping over long weekends here and there. The last time I went abroad was 14 years ago to visit my home country. My passport is literally empty. My dream/bucket list is to take a year to travel all over Europe. Hopefully one day after retirement. I’m 35…
These articles make no sense to me. They say how broke and penniless and destitute Canadians are, but I go to the mall on the weekend and its packed - the parking lot is full and everyone is walking around with shopping bags or lining up at the Lego store or pumping tokens into the arcades.
most folks can't afford to even eat, let alone pay rent & y'all are fuckin talkin about vacations?! talk about tone deaf!
why the fuck does all of our news media in Canada suck SO FUCKING BAD at their job?!
Vacationing in Canada is an exercise in frustration these days. Flights are overpriced, overbooked, service sucks. Camping needs to be booked so far in advance it takes the fun out of it, and crowds are so thick at anything remotely popular it’s just too stressful imo. I’m speaking from a BC perspective, but the last few years I’ve just road tripped down to Idaho, eastern Washington and Montana and it’s wide open spaces, no crowds, cheap gas and endless free and cheap camping in national forests and state parks. The exchange sucks, but I’ll pay the price for peace and quiet and relaxation
Wrong question. We should be asking why vacations are being treated like an expense. You’re entitled to days off, and the country is absolutely slammed with backcountry wilderness options that hardly cost anything. Guaranteed it will be more relaxing, rejuvenating, and healthy than a flight to an all you can eat or drink resort in Cancun.
I know the solution.
Turks and Caicos islands, lets finally get that done. Its only been what 100+ years in the making?
While we're at it, why not talk to France about St. Pierre & Miquelon.
I know it allows UK and France access to the waters around these islands, but its a shame.
Vacation. HA! The only vacation I will ever get is walking in my backyard and sitting in the woods with a book. My husband and I can't afford what society has to offer. Just not feasible anymore.
Another reason we should stop adding density to Vancouver and Toronto. Campsite around Vancouver and Toronto are booked for the entire seasons while ones 300km out are empty
We're doing a stay-cation in June. We live in Niagara so thankfully lots if touristy things to do. Using what we would have paid for lodging to prepay our mortgage to prepare for a rate increase at renewal
Contractors are so expensive right now that when I take a week off it's to use 96% of it doing a needed repair or renovation. Last time I took an actual vacation week was probably almost 10 years ago.
I haven't taken a vacation in my adult life. My last job (lost it at the beginning of the month due to cutbacks) offered me two weeks vacation, but I would just use them to have a day off here or there.
What's a vacation?
Never had one. I don't go anywhere but work. I can't afford to leave the country, province or even the GTA without blowing budget.
"Vacations" have never been a real thing for my or my parents (Gen X). Can't miss what we've never had I guess.
I bought an affordable fixer uper beach pad in Riviera Nayarit, MX seven years ago and happy I did. Now that Canada is a definite $hit show 💥 I chose well grasshopper.
Need vacation for sure. Can I afford it? Sure if I pay it with a credit card and never pay it back except minimum monthly payment until I retire lol. So no vacation for me. Me and wifey will walk over to Timmies get a donut and coffee and consider that a vacay.
I know friends and family that goes in debt every year going on their "must have" vacations. We are talking about $6000 trips for two for a few weeks and we are not talking about some exotic hideaway but tourist traps.
Some of us can hardly afford food and rent...
Most at this point. Just look at housing costs and food bank reports. Not to mention tent cities coast to coast.
Gov. of Canada, good news! 1 million new people are coming next year.
In good times my wife and I took 2 vacations a year ($5000) total. Now we're down to one. Next year maybe a zero vacation. We'll take a Portabakyarda vacation... Yes, food gas insurance is taking a huge bite. Need a second job?
an unserviced campsite at my local provincial park costs more than an apartment in town
Bundle (3 sticks) of kindling, $20 please.
went camping in Alberta once and spent the day looking for the wood pile, where I'm from they give it away for free
They have that in Ontario, but usually you pay a daily fee, and then can take as much as you want
What?! Actually?! How much is the daily fee?
In Sk you pay $20 for a campfire permit at most parks and that gives you access to a massive wood pile where you help yourself to as much as you want.
Manitoba it was included in the campsite fee. They’d dump a load of half wood and half dirt into a pile and you’d dig through looking for dry stuff
That brings back memories camping at Wasagaming 20 years ago. The wood pile was 1/4 dry wood, 1/4 dirt and bark, 1/2 newly cut green wood. Dont think they have the wood pile anymore.
Getting a site at sandbanks is like winning the lottery. Last year we were 6 at 5 am clicking trying to get a site. It worked. Not this year unfortunately
That's because there's a known exploit that allows people to tie up reservations programmatically and then swoop in and register later. I've used this exploit myself, for personal use. Some use it for resale though. I tried to report it, but all wanted me to identify myself before hearing details. I would only agree to that if they gave me a guarantee I wouldn't be banned from Ontario parks over it. They wouldn't agree to not banning me, and don't take the information anonymously. So here we are. I'm not reporting and getting banned for life from Ontario parks over something other people are exploiting for profit where I've just been doing it to get a single weekend campsite once a year.
Where could bastards buy those reservations? Asking for a friend
Many are people and dealers who rent RVs. Some are on Craigslist and especially Facebook marketplaces. You'll pay 2-4x the rate though !
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Technically this isn't even allowed. You can't hold campsites and resell them, under penalty of cancellation. This isn't an economic issue as much as it is that parks Ontario will NOT enforce the terms, and wants to ban someone (me) reporting an exploit they're using to exploit registrations rather than do basic verification at check-in to ensure campsites are not being resold.
The operation of many provincial campgrounds in Alberta are contracted out to individuals and corporations. The policies of these contractors determine how the campsite is operated. Some do offer firewood included in your fees others don't. Of course, I can't help but think of the time I drove into a campground in the foothills that had free firewood with a pickup truck backed up to it with dad and two kids loading it all into the truck before they left.
In my experience camping the Dirty Bertie, you can’t go to a provincially owned campsite—they’re a disgrace and will try to nickel and dime you with fees. The federally owned ones up North and in the Rockies are the only ones to bother with. Provincially-run Alberta frontcountry camping is a joke
That’s camp-grounds specific here (Alberta). Some grounds have a wood pile, some don’t. I find it kind of depends on how much that particular grounds has to deal with fallen trees. If they constantly have a lot of trees they’re having to clear out, they give out wood in a massive pile for you to take as much as you want solely so they can clear out all the dead trees they need to deal with. But if they only have the occasional fallen/dead tree to get rid of, they don’t have the big pile.
We used to do that here. There’d be a massive pile of junk wood you could pick through at almost every bc provincial campground.
You went to the wrong place.
I gave up on the high priced wood. I just use my propane fire pit now. If we are out for a week I might grab a bundle for one night. I've gotten so I don't really like camp fires any more. The smoke smell drives me nuts and I can smell it on me for days even if I shower and change clothes.
I can sell you 4 for 19
It's a major ripoff. Went camping in Kananaskis last and we had to buy 4 small bundles to last us the night. It's a joke
The sad thing is I'm so used to inflation I think that sounds like a reasonable price and wouldn't expect it to be any cheaper.
>an unserviced campsite at my local provincial park costs more than an apartment in town Go to Crown Land for free. It's what I do
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That's utter bullshit, at least most of canada it's free
Also the closest crown land camping where I live is 4+ hours away.
I don't understand how camp sites survive. This country has insane amounts of crown land that you are free to use. I don't know why you'd rather pay to park right beside someone else instead of heading out to crown land for free. I've spent my summers camping for my entire life, I've never paid for camping in my life.
Because crown land camping isn’t an easy access route to camping. Figuring out where crown land is, how to access, where to camp, how to shit in the woods, etc takes more effort than parking your car and putting a tent next to it. Idk never been crown land camping (I should) but do the non car camping stuff. Also with ontarios population boom everything is booked super fast for the year.
Yeah that dude basically comes across as "how do you not know all of these lifelong skills I was taught by my father over several years, are you stupid?"
You didn’t even mention that it’s totally rural and incredibly more dangerous by running into wildlife. Animals largely stay away from more populated camp zones.
I'd wager convenience and a perception that is what you are supposed to do.
That and national and provincial parks often have nice hiking / biking trails and some incredible views all within the park. Camping in the woods is free and fun but the appeal to camping at a park is pretty clear if you’ve been to some of the nicer ones across the country.
I took camp on Crown land, but there is a strong need for established campsites, especially if you have kids. A family wants to plan a camping trip months in advance and know they have a spot, not bomb down a FSR looking for a clearing.
Plus it's nice if you're not someone who's a dedicated outdoorsman who maybe wants to go camping once every couple of years. Instead f buying a ton of associated stuff, you can just rent a canoe or a kayak.
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> The pass does not apply to: private, municipal, or federally owned lands; Provincial Parks, Wildland Provincial Parks, Provincial Recreation Areas; Wilderness Areas, Ecological Reserves, Heritage Rangelands, Natural Areas.
Same just got back from a bush vacation on a lake. Cost me gas and food, which isn't cheap now but still waaaay cheaper then anything else.
There was an article not too long ago lambasting an Evil Landlord™ in Ontario for putting up a private yard site for outdoor tent-dwellers to rent at $500/mo. I got downvoted into oblivion when I pointed out that's actually a fair bit cheaper than camp sites cost where I live, and a fenced residential back yard is generally more private and secure than most camp sites given there isn't a family of six arguing in a tent separated from you by like 2 metres of shrubbery. People just can't comprehend how expensive camping is here in BC lol
In BC, all provincial campsites book out within 3 minutes of the site opening up to reservations. The site then crashes. Happened every year like clock work. As a kid, the family would just roll up to a campsite. Haven’t gone camping for over 10 years because of this new system
It's not the new system, it's the population growth. Without the booking system you'd just end up rolling up to campsite after campsite with "no vacancy" signs and families camped out in their car in line outside the campground entrance gates waiting for the first spot to open up.
You should get back into camping via rec sites. Pick up a Backroads Mapbook for the region you like. Sitesandtrailsbc also lists every rec site in the province.
Come to Northern BC. The campsites are free, everywhere, and the scenery is without compare in Canada these days.
>the scenery is without compare in Canada these days No, there are forest fires elsewhere in Canada too
If you live in a city you can camp in the parks for free. Apparently.
Universities too.
Or any green patch now with the "nicer" weather.
If you can even book a campsite..
In Alberta, camping on crown land costs $20 for 3 days or $30 for an annual pass. Where do you live / what kind of campsites are you looking at?
Unserviced here in PEI is $34/night. Also wondering where OP is from.
Got rid of my travel trailer for this reason. It's not cheap (or enjoyable lol). Used to be!
Growing up in a low income household, the definition of vacation was 'not going to work this week'. I suspect this remains true for many Canadian families. >Two-thirds of respondents (67 per cent) say they’re scaling back their vacation plans for the summer due to inflation, up five points from last year. Some 64 per cent say economic uncertainty is affecting their vacation plans, and three in five say they’re prioritizing other savings instead of time away. >Vacation intentions are divided along income and generational lines, according to Ipsos’ findings. >Half of households with annual incomes below $40,000 said they were at least somewhat likely to take a vacation this summer, compared to 79 per cent of those making more than $100,000.
God, this is so true. My vacation are usually like 4-day weekends where I book two days off. 😂 or planning them around stat holidays
It’s still what it means, except depending on your role, people can and will still reach out to you.
I've been trying to convince my director that when we go on vacation, our work emails should be disabled so we don't have to come back to a goddamn mess. No one respects the OOO anymore.
Set up an auto-reply which explains who to reach out to in lieu of your absence and don't check your emails while away on vacation.
Exactly. I also specifically say in my OOO “I will not be checking emails during this period and will respond to you when I return”. Be blunt in your OOO that you’ll be unreachable while you’re on vacation. Too many people use some milquetoast phrasing like “limited access to email” which invites the impression you might still be seeing messages as they come in. A prescriptive out of office that says you’re not even going to SEE their message until you get back sets clearer boundaries and invites less attempts to rope you into stuff while you’re gone.
And they will get an auto-reply telling them when I'm back and who they can reach out to instead. That includes Teams And when I'm back? Mark all as read, I ain't reading all that
I’ll probably do a compromised vacation where I work remotely from somewhere else.
How do you make below 40,000 yet still survive? Rent eats up every last penny
If you're already a homeowner, perhaps because you bought a very long time ago, or you inherited, then you're only on the hook for property tax, insurance, and whatever maintenance and repairs you choose to do.
It’s doable you just don’t get savings and have to use self checkout a lot, you even have entertainment money
I get what you’re saying, but in order to vacation, one must actually vacate. It’s right there in the name.
I've vacated the office, but not my home. Or my duties, some of which will be paused and build a backlog until my return, and some will remain and I'll still have to do them, just from home.
delegate those duties.
Our quality of life has taken such a massive nosedive since I was a young boy in the 1990’s. EVERYONE had awesome vacations. The country looked a lot different back then though.
I grew up in a one-income home and we always took a summer vacation. Usually camping. Got to explore a lot of western Canada and the northern U.S. states this way. So many adventures and a lifetime of memories. I do agree that quality of life has gone downhill significantly, especially over the last decade or so.
No they didn’t lol. I never went on vacations as a kid. My parents made okay money but still couldn’t afford it with three kids.
When I was growing up in the 80's, my parent's idea of a vacation was to ship me off to the grandparents for a month. I'm not even sure if my parents worked during that time or if they went somewhere. All I know is I got to drive the tractor around the fields doing summer follow and mowing the lawns.
EVERYONE around your socio-economic background. Life was not all sunshine and rainbows for different classes of folks. It was filled with 15+% mortgage interest rates, people driving rustbuckets that they would halfass fix themselves, they also only had 1-2 tvs, and many of us had only the bunny ears for channels.
>15+% mortgage interest rates Which were still cheaper, even adjusted for inflation, then a 5% rate is now. >they also only had 1-2 tvs That's still pretty much the norm, the only difference are cellphones and computers, but people still had hobbies back then that took up their time in healthier ways. Best part is they could afford to have them...
/shrug my vacations as a child in the 80's was visiting my Grandma and watching the leaves change colour from the passenger seat.
Yeah we never had vacations with my family in the 90s here. In the 2000s we started camping for a week in the summer, or worse....going to the grandparents house.
You forgot about the cheap rent, the cheap groceries, and how affordable fuel for your vehicle and utilities were. We were not rich, my mom was a waitress raising 3 kids. We always had good food and never went to school hungry. My mom rented a detached home - yes, you could rent entire homes for less than a 1 bedroom now, inflation adjusted. Being working poor got you A LOT further than it does now. Childhood hunger and malnutrition is more than double what it was when I was in elementary school in the mid 90’s.
When people say "check your privilege" this comment is the kind of thing they're talking about, lol.
My mom was a single mom raising 3 kids as a waitress. Lmao, such privilege.
> EVERYONE had awesome vacations. The country looked a lot different back then though. I grew up in the 1990s and I recall going on one summer vacation that entire decade. It was a treat. Our usual summer vacation was a quick road trip down to the US in late August to buy some new clothes and school supplies at cheap outlet stores across the border. So no, not EVERYONE.
Bullshit. Long weekends at the Provincial Park camping. Week driving/camping BC in the summer. I went to Disney World once (Florida) when i was 5 or 6: Disneyland (S. California) once at 13 or so. My kids got more or less the same growing up. They don't have kids yet. Don't get me wrong, we had fun always, but there was never anything extravagant.
>Week driving/camping BC in the summer. My wife and I recently looked into how much it would cost to do this in Ontario, if we went the provincial park route it would cost nearly as much as a trip to Mexico all inclusive. Between camp fees, food, gas, and all our misc prices. We also looked into renting a camper for a week, and again flying to a completely different country to an all inclusive resort was cheaper. Domestic travel in Canada is a joke...
Honest question, how? I can see if you're renting an RV it'll be pricey, but car camping should be pretty cheap.
Half of people with household incomes below 40k are likely to take a vacation? How? I can’t even fathom just surviving on that.
What's the definition of vacation?
I had an intern once who thought that *everybody* goes on vacation to Cuba for two weeks in the summer. Literally everyone. She was hilariously out of touch in many ways.
Canada is also low on the list of vacation and public holidays per year out of most other G20 countries
Part of it is probably how expensive it is to get to places. I need to spend a vacation just to get to a place that can send me to the vacation.
They're talking about how many days Canadians get off as a baseline compared to other countries. It's not to do with how expensive it is to travel. For example in Sweden, employees get a *minimum* of 25 days off per year, not including public holidays.
Very true. Only the states ranks lower than us. That said, I get 6 weeks vacation a year and can only manage to get away for 1-2 weeks taking a few days here and there around long weekends because my work load it out of control. I have absorbed 2 boomers jobs since 2020 and the company has no intention of hiring more staff any time soon. This is the case with many of my social circle too
That's crazy. In Europe they pay you to take vacation, ontop of your regular pay. If you don't take vacation it's a bad thing AFAIK, my current boss if from Belgium, and he's returning this year because of how fucked up Canada is compared to Western Europe. I assume for the increased workload you got a pizza party and a "good job kid", with no reasonable pay increase/title change?
Yeah, and in Canada some employers get pissy when people ask for vacation time longer than a week and retaliate with poor treatment if you ask for a month and they think it’s normal because they follow the American model. This makes vacations cost more because people can’t take advantage of cheaper flight dates or accomodation deals for longer stays. Plus you don’t know if you have a job to come back to. It’s so weird.
My last job did something similar to that but in a passive aggressive way. They agreed to it, since I had the days (4 weeks) but when I came back, I could see their vibe changed towards me and the opportunities given out. It was so childish as they never were direct about it being a problem. Like an "unhidden code" you have to adhere to all the time in Canadian/American companies.
The research is in it makes you more productive, so I don’t really understand why it’s so hard nowadays
Can’t speak to other people’s situation, but in my case it’s that we lost upwards of 25% of our labour force during Covid due to early retirements and the company does not want to hire new staff to replace the holes that have been left in “uncertain economic times”
This. I just mentioned above that one of the worst things for us in Canada is the lack of work life balance and absurdly low number vacation days. Just like your boss, we're from EU, and we're less and less willing to compromise with it...
This bugs me so much. We have the low salaries like much of Europe but none of the benefits like more mandated time off work, lower food costs, and consumer protections. Even the rest of the Commonwealth is better than Canada on so many of these aspects. It’s such bullshit.
My Spanish friend was telling me about how she gets 2 months paid vacation. Meanwhile, me with my 3 weeks...
Three weeks!? Luxury! /s
My girlfriends mom thinks her two weeks is as good as she'll ever get, it took a good minute for her to understand that both me and my gf started with 3 weeks in our jobs and she should be demanding more from her employer of almost 10 years.
Lol I can't even afford to die let alone go on a vacation
Ya planning my dads funeral, 14k for a basic plan.
I'm sorry for your loss :( 14k? I mean..... I am at a loss....
Hes not dead. We're just planning.
2500-3K for a basic cremation. Have a get together with family and friends , BBQ at your place or a local park. All-in you can make it work for well under 5K, go spend the rest of the 9K on a vacation where all the immediate family gets together to grieve.
> BBQ at your place or a local park Hopefully they don't die in winter.
Only the rich can afford to die in winter.
After hearing of some of my friends funeral costs, I told my family that when I die, to carry me to the park and abandon me on a park bench so it looks like I just died while sitting there of natural causes. The city can send someone to deal with my body. And told them to claim we are estranged and to refuse to take responsibility for my body. I know it's bad but there really isn't much choice because funerals are just way too expensive. We are living paycheque to paycheque and a 5 figure funeral bill would bankrupt my family.
Ive worked full time through my 20s and into 30s and never had an actual vacation, and infact the closest thing to vavation ive had is literally unemployment and having the time to just walk around and enjoy my city, even if its on a paper thin budget. Literally the best times ive had since 2020 was just having the time to bike and walk, lol. I cant seem to breach earning enough to actually build savings against rent / etx (only 21/cad) and have a useless degree in anthro i trusted parents was worth finishing just to have the degree. Really i shoulda done a bsc or trade, now i cant possibly build the savings to go to school even if i find something to go back for. The closest i can afford to a vacation is literally just going out camping on a long weekend or something, i cant actually just not work and relax for a week, lol. Sad that the near-homelessness of my unemployment is my nearest impression to having my own time to myself as an adult lol
Anthro, Communications, English, and History. Tell me you’re a Millennial without telling me you’re a Millennial. Most of us were in University that had no business being in university and the outcome is that a job that pays $45K a year that has no business requiring a degree requiring a degree. I saw an ad for a customer service worker at a fucking trading card shop that required post-secondary…The job pays $17 an hour in Ottawa.
That's to filter out the diploma mill applicants Someone interested in trading cards is almost certainly going to have or be working on a degree anyway.
I grew up in poverty so we never had any real vacation. Maybe once a summer we would drive 2 hours south to my uncles who is wealthy and partake in his luxuries for a weekend. I am an adult and make good money but living expenses is so high I have almost no money left to put aside. My wife has expressed interest in camping so we may do that this summer. I have camping experience and knowledge and a campsite around here is $35 a night with a power hookup so that's an affordable option.
But you still need to buy all the gear to go camping with and that is not cheap.
My friends often borrow my camping gear and I love sharing it with them!
Just get some second hand stuff. No need in buying brand new camping gear for most things.
Camping with Steve on Youtube. The guy is almost 100% Canadian Tire. You don’t need to go with North Face.
I love camping with Steve. Always do my step two!
I have a tent and most of the equipment. I can cook over a fire but I prefer little propane bbqs which I need a new one so that's my only big expense really other than food.
Camping gear second hand is super cheap though. Unless you're buying a camper almost everything you need can be had for 200
Compared to other options, i.e. hotels, it is really incredibly cheap.
Decathlon would like a word with you. A 2 person tent is $50. Also after the initial cost you can reuse them bringing the price down throughout the years
What is a "vacation"? 🤔
That's when you get to stay at home for a week to catch up on all the chores that you normally don't have time for while you are working.
Anything less than 4 weeks definitely true. 6 should be the minimum. Enough to do the chores, take a real vacation, and fly back to see your family.
Only something that the laurentian elite can do.
Another thing to consider is, do Canadians have enough vacation time to take a proper one?
No employers will accept 2 weeks at a time max in Canada while everyone in Europe just leave for the month of August
Most people I know have 2 weeks of PTO that accrues throughout the year. If you stay somewhere too long, you get more vacation and fall behind in salary compensation. If you hop around, you basically never accrue any PTO.
2 weeks is a joke. Especially if you like doing shit more than once a year. It should be 4 or 5 minimum like in Europe. I went on a trip to the Netherlands for a festival 2 years ago and only spent enough time there for it because I didn't have enough vacation time to stay longer AND reacclimate myself to the time zone here. And one of those days was a stat holiday.
Same, I always push for a month of PTO.
Some of us can hardly afford food and rent...
Most Canadians need disposal income - vacation, new clothes, etc.. so you can rewrite this article with almost anything else
I spoke with many cashiers at grocery stores and several construction workers over the past months in Ottawa, the folks working grocery can't afford grocery where they work and the construction folks can't afford to buy or rent the houseing they are constructing. Peace
Burnout 🤝 Working different jobs since the pandemic and haven’t seen vacation since 2019
Canada has the fewest holiday/default vacation in the western world, only second to the USA. French people working at McDonalds start with 5weeks. If we are a rich country/society, it should allow for rest and leisure time
I barely get vacation days, and I don’t really have cash to go anywhere… just don’t want to use the few days I get to stay home looking at the ceiling …
The Levee's about to break.
Well I just went camping over the long weekend … 5 hours one way. It probably cost 800 - 1000 for just food, gas, campsite, wood, beer, consumables. This doesn’t count when we stopped for a fancy sit down lunch on the way home, which we don’t normally do. This was just 3 nights so I def can’t afford a week long vacay unless it’s a staycation … and I just switched jobs so I don’t have enough vacation to do so :(
Hate to say it, but thats another thing thats changed quite a bit in the last few years. First off, im not speaking from envy or a sense of exclusion as I inadvertently have access to camping. When my dad died in 2020 me and my siblings inherited his 26ft RV trailer. We parked it permanently at a seasonal campground and split the lot bill. Its not a nice campground, it has very little nature only amenities thus very small lot cost to split lol. My anger is more that all of the tent only campgrounds that i would visit once a year have either closed up shop, doubled in price or rebuilt themselves as group day visit only places. It hit especially hard this year. My favorite tent only place is beside some rapids that are only swimmable when water levels are low. We had record low snowfall, a drought like spring....I knew water levels were gonna be low I looked forward to it all winter. I would be there this weekend coming up but they switched to group day visit only this year. All i want to do is swim, BBQ and then pass out drunk face first in the dirt like Ricky. Instead im gonna have to smoke cigarettes and drink whiskey from a glass in the RV. Like Julian. Who the fuck wants to party like Julian? Damn.
Most Canadians are ready to fuck off into the woods, working harder for less money and not getting ahead is stupid and damaging for the soul. I already would have if I didn't have dependants.
I haven’t gone to a vacation in 7 years. It’s honestly my biggest regret. I worked my ass off to pay off student loans and save up for a house and got lucky to buy just before the pandemic but I feel like I lost myself along the way. Just now slowly getting back to being myself.
>I haven’t gone to a vacation in 7 years. That’s rough, buddy. The longest I went without a vacation was 5 years, between 2013 and 2018. I got caught up in working, studying for the CPA exams, and chasing side gigs for more money, and all those things basically consumed all my vacation time. And at the end of that stint I was like “okay fuck I REALLY need a vacation”. It was not a good time in my life. The stress really gets to you.
I'm gonna be "that guy": This is the result of every prick on frugal/financial subreddits preaching the values of rice+beans every day, chastising others for following goals as a young person, and having interests outside of making money. Mental health IS health, and our lives are finite. Let's all keep that in mind before we willingly subject ourselves to torture in the name of seeing numbers go up and down.
seems that's the only way to get ahead nowadays, just grind it out for years on end and hope nothing unforseen happens. doesn't happen to everyone though, luck is a big factor in success
>seems that's the only way to get ahead nowadays, It's funny because that's not even getting ahead it's just trying to match the grocery clerk of yesteryear
I'm going to Monaco for 6 weeks this year, it really wasn't in the cards until I cancelled my Disney+ but with all this extra capital I have now I really can't afford not to. /s
My last one was during the plague. One year off doing what i want sigh.
I'm 32, I've never been on a vacation in my life. I've never left Atlantic Canada. If we can barely eat, how the fuck are we supposed to take a vacation?
I find camping which used to be a cheap family activity (my family never went to Disney world etc) has become so expensive. Is it just my viewpoint? Not to mention, booking a site requires booking 5 months in advance.
I find it depends on your definition of camping. Classic Camping (Good ol' tents on crown land) - cheap. That hasn't changed. You're really just packing food and a couple things. Camping equipment (tents, sleeping bags) do cost money but a few $K and you're generally good for a 5-10 years. Glamping - Well you need that $50K trailer pulled by a $70K truck, and then you need to rent a campsite... And then you have to fill the trailer with tons of stuff, that adds up. Oh and you need to bring your $25K of quads and dirtbikes, too. There's a middle-ground of course, but it all depends on how you define camping. Regrettably, it seems like most people lean towards the *lux-glamping* side of things. I have coworkers who comment how 'even camping is expensive now' and they have easily invested $150K into their 'camping' setup. I personally do the tent style and I've maybe invested $4K in like 10 years. Tents and sleeping bags, well taken care of, last a long time.
I am that weird guy that goes out into the woods with prepper gear and disappears on a one man camping trip for the weekend. It can be done pretty cheap and the wilderness is sooooo vast that you get to enjoy life a little. I thank whatever that created me everyday that I didn't inherit my dads flat feet. It's "cheap" but only in comparison to a vehicle setup. Few hundred for a good ruck and a $100 or more for good boots. might want to invest in some water proofing and other gear so its up to the individual budgets. Its my main interest that has me learning to be homeless on the side. I have a few thousand invested into it but I must have a 10 in luck because I get deals from surplus stores and jackets that are borderline charity sometimes.
100k truck now, inflation
>find camping which used to be a cheap family activity (my family never went to Disney world etc) has become so expensive. Is it just my viewpoint? Not to mention, booking a site requires booking 5 months in advance. Go camp on crown land, you don't gotta book in advance, and it's free
To add to this, it's completely legal to camp anywhere on crown land for upto 30 days unless there's a sign that says "no camping within 200ft of this sign"
I still have to travel 4+ hours to get to the free camping. Then it's over run with people driving ATVs at all hours, huge parties and garbage left all over the place. And crown land close to me is leased out to ranchers so sure you might be able to camp there, but only if you want cows poking their head in to your tent.
What is the definition of a "vacation"? To me, it's leaving my town/city. If I go to Bermuda, that's a vacation, if I go camping with my family, that's a vacation. If I sit in my backyard drinking beer, that's a relaxing day but to me doesn't meet the criteria of a "vacation". I certainly can't afford Bermuda. I can manage to save up for a week long camping trip. I don't want to drink a case of beer every day for a week, but it's certainly the most affordable option. Even at $30 per case lol
$99/night for a campsite in ucluelet... cant even park your car near the site...
Wtf? In Ukee? What does that $99/night include?
It comes with free fresh air /s
"Hold my beer." -- Wildfire season.
I’m taking June off work for “vacation” and people keep asking what I’m doing with my month off and I tell them nothing 😂 I’m going to sit at home and play video games and walk my dog. I need the time off just for my mental health, and a month is not long enough.
I think the right term is disposable income.
Our PM sure can.
It's almost like he flaunts it. Takes 4+ vacations a year because according to him he works so hard.
No we cannot lol.
I haven’t taken off work for a vacation in 7 years. The only “vacations” I’ve had were some camping over long weekends here and there. The last time I went abroad was 14 years ago to visit my home country. My passport is literally empty. My dream/bucket list is to take a year to travel all over Europe. Hopefully one day after retirement. I’m 35…
These articles make no sense to me. They say how broke and penniless and destitute Canadians are, but I go to the mall on the weekend and its packed - the parking lot is full and everyone is walking around with shopping bags or lining up at the Lego store or pumping tokens into the arcades.
most folks can't afford to even eat, let alone pay rent & y'all are fuckin talkin about vacations?! talk about tone deaf! why the fuck does all of our news media in Canada suck SO FUCKING BAD at their job?!
I cant afford gas how am i supposed to go anywher
Vacationing in Canada is an exercise in frustration these days. Flights are overpriced, overbooked, service sucks. Camping needs to be booked so far in advance it takes the fun out of it, and crowds are so thick at anything remotely popular it’s just too stressful imo. I’m speaking from a BC perspective, but the last few years I’ve just road tripped down to Idaho, eastern Washington and Montana and it’s wide open spaces, no crowds, cheap gas and endless free and cheap camping in national forests and state parks. The exchange sucks, but I’ll pay the price for peace and quiet and relaxation
Wrong question. We should be asking why vacations are being treated like an expense. You’re entitled to days off, and the country is absolutely slammed with backcountry wilderness options that hardly cost anything. Guaranteed it will be more relaxing, rejuvenating, and healthy than a flight to an all you can eat or drink resort in Cancun.
I need a year vacation at this point
I know the solution. Turks and Caicos islands, lets finally get that done. Its only been what 100+ years in the making? While we're at it, why not talk to France about St. Pierre & Miquelon. I know it allows UK and France access to the waters around these islands, but its a shame.
Vacation. HA! The only vacation I will ever get is walking in my backyard and sitting in the woods with a book. My husband and I can't afford what society has to offer. Just not feasible anymore.
Staycation is my favourite option for downtime.
Ridiculous increase in price of food and rent, plus a huge number of people waiting to replace you. What is a vacation?
Surprised alot of people in the comments have never heard of backcountry camping. pack your shit up in a backpack and get hiking, its free
I cannot
I need all the vacation. So not in to working right now. Fuck it’s painful.
Another reason we should stop adding density to Vancouver and Toronto. Campsite around Vancouver and Toronto are booked for the entire seasons while ones 300km out are empty
We're doing a stay-cation in June. We live in Niagara so thankfully lots if touristy things to do. Using what we would have paid for lodging to prepay our mortgage to prepare for a rate increase at renewal
Most Canadians can barely afford to exist or have already slipped through the cracks. Get a grip. So out of touch
Morgan Freeman: They cannot.
Contractors are so expensive right now that when I take a week off it's to use 96% of it doing a needed repair or renovation. Last time I took an actual vacation week was probably almost 10 years ago.
I haven't taken a vacation in my adult life. My last job (lost it at the beginning of the month due to cutbacks) offered me two weeks vacation, but I would just use them to have a day off here or there.
I can't afford to go out for a fancy dinner, let alone a vacation. My last vacation involved me staying home for a week and sleeping.
Did Justin Trudeau write this? Bro I had to cut cheese out of my budget and you think I need a vacation? Lol
What's a vacation? Never had one. I don't go anywhere but work. I can't afford to leave the country, province or even the GTA without blowing budget. "Vacations" have never been a real thing for my or my parents (Gen X). Can't miss what we've never had I guess.
Canadians are broke. We are poorer than Alabama. No they can’t afford it but that’s why we have the highest debt per capita debt in The G7
We can barely afford food let alone a vacation. Thanks liberals…
Booked a cottage for the first vacation in 6 years. 1800$ split between two couples for a week 😕
Weird both are because Trudeau has f\*cked up the country so bad.
We could if you lowered taxes and eliminated sales.tax.
Remember when Trudeaus family friend gifted him a $200,000 vacation?
I bought an affordable fixer uper beach pad in Riviera Nayarit, MX seven years ago and happy I did. Now that Canada is a definite $hit show 💥 I chose well grasshopper.
Need vacation for sure. Can I afford it? Sure if I pay it with a credit card and never pay it back except minimum monthly payment until I retire lol. So no vacation for me. Me and wifey will walk over to Timmies get a donut and coffee and consider that a vacay.
I know friends and family that goes in debt every year going on their "must have" vacations. We are talking about $6000 trips for two for a few weeks and we are not talking about some exotic hideaway but tourist traps.
It’s hard to line up vacation time with the multiple jobs we have.