After a five-year pandemic- and snow-related closure, Yosemite National Park has reopened its “glamping” campgrounds, where visitors can take advantage of showers, gourmet meals and views of the park’s wild interior. can.
Prospective campers can now enter a drawing to experience three of the five campsites available at High Sierra Camp from June through September.
Two other sites, Vogelsang and Lake Merced, the highest campground and the oldest and most remote, established in 1916, respectively, will remain closed through the 2024 season. Become. He could not be reached by park officials or Aramark, the park’s concessionaire, as to why the two campgrounds remain closed.
According to their website, more than 13,000 visitors stay at High Sierra Camp each year, and an additional 1,000 backpackers who pass through there each year stop to eat at the campground.
‘Glamping’ is a more comfortable or glamorous version of camping, and has become increasingly popular in recent decades. Visitors can choose to pay $1,403 for a guided tour of the park for a week-long stay, or pay $172 to $185 per night to reserve a bed.
Jane Simpson, president of the leadership training program for the Sierra Club Angeles Chapter, said there is controversy among some environmentalists who take a hard line against any development in pristine wilderness. But Simpson was happy to hear the campground will reopen to the public this year, he said.
“This experience is phenomenal. People are very conscious of their impact,” Simpson said, recalling a visit to the High Sierra camp in 2015.
As an avid hiker and backpacker himself, Simpson is used to having to carry all his essentials with him when visiting Yosemite National Park. But thanks to High Sierra Camp’s amenities, visitors can leave their tents and cooking essentials behind, with running water and three meals a day prepared by professional chefs.
Aramark and the National Park Service demonstrate their commitment to protecting the environment on their websites. “We take our role as stewards very seriously and work actively to protect our resources for generations to come,” the High Sierra Camp website states. Masu.
Jeff Jenkins, assistant professor of parks and protected areas at the Sierra Nevada Research Institute at the University of California, Merced, said the National Park Service needs to balance protecting national parks with making them accessible to everyone. Ta.
Jenkins recalled a time when her family was staying together at a High Sierra camp. “She was able to get out of there, too.” First-time campers, inexperienced campers, seniors and families may prefer to stay at the well-equipped High Sierra Camp. yeah.
By creating designated areas for semi-permanent shelters, Jenkins said “sacrifice zones” would allow larger areas of wilderness to remain untouched. “The impact is primarily limited to trail corridors and these areas of the wilderness, these hotspots,” Jenkins said.
Because of the urgent need to reduce humans’ impact on the environment, the National Park Service will add features such as bear lockers that prevent bears from easily finding food sources near human residences. Jenkins pointed out that they are being forced to innovate.
But the controversy surrounding these High Sierra camps is nothing new. David White, director of global sustainability and innovation at Arizona State University, calls it the “fundamental paradox” of national parks balancing access and protection.
White said the social and cultural impact of park visits can also help shift the conversation around sustainability and changing personal habits to protect the environment. For visitors, he said, it will “help them gain a deeper awareness and understanding of the critical environmental issues we face, such as climate change.”
For White, who has visited many times, the wonders of Yosemite National Park never get old. “It’s some of the most spectacular natural beauty that exists anywhere in the world,” he said. White said he remains humbled by the sheer scale of the landscape and the history of indigenous peoples who were violently removed from their land to create Yosemite.
“When you’re there, you just feel like you’re human, and you feel insignificant in some important way,” White said.
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