While it hardly qualified me as a wilderness expert, my time as a Cub Scout and Boy Scout at least gave me a general idea of what camping is all about. But even that kind of familiarity is not something many, if not most, immigrants possess when they arrive in this land of lakes, forests and campgrounds.

For much of this decade, Parks Canada, the national parks service, and some of its provincial counterparts have been holding learn-to-camp programs at various levels of complexity, although all appear more complete than the chaos of Cub Scout camping. They are aimed at novices, generally, but have attracted many immigrants.

Earlier this week, I took a look at the most basic class. At the Canada Science and Technology Museum in Ottawa, three students hired for the summer were showing interested visitors how to pitch a family-sized tent, and set up and operate a camp stove, offering tips on keeping food safe from animals and spoilage as well as fire building and safety. Long paddles and two gadgets that tip to give some sense of what it takes to do stand-up paddle boarding were used to lure bystanders.

Parks Canada also offers novice campers the opportunity to get their training while spending the night outdoors using its gear. Where appropriate, those sessions provide for a full Canadian experience with canoe and fishing lessons. Ontario Parks even has “graduate” courses that include “tarping skills” and “camping kitchen tricks.”

Ed Jager, the director of visitor experience at Parks Canada, told me the program dated back to 2006, when the service noticed that camping was slightly declining. (Before any recreational vehicle owners get worked up, we’re only talking about traditional tent camping here.)

Research conducted by Parks Canada, he said, showed that the biggest barriers for most people to camping were lack of knowledge about how to do it and lack of equipment.

“So we wanted to give people a context where they could learn to do it right and be comfortable with it,” Mr. Jager said. “Camping is sort of an essential Canadian experience.”

It’s also inexpensive. In British Columbia’s provincial parks, campsite permits range from 5 to 35 Canadian dollars a night.

Sure, everyone can offer some horror story about camping, usually involving biblical rain, bugs or both. But some of my fondest memories of our sons’ childhoods involved modest, weekend camping trips often with other families or, in the case of our youngest son, his scout group.

Parks Canada and many provincial parks services now offer alternatives to tents for people who find them uncomfortable or unappealing. Some offer Mongolian-style yurts at campgrounds. But more commonly, they are following the lead of Quebec and offering semi-permanent tents on wooden platforms with proper beds and, in some cases, stoves, fridges and heaters.

There have also been some efforts to overcome another barrier to camping for many people: simply getting to a park. Two nonprofit groups offer low-cost bus service to several national and provincial parks from six Canadian cities.

Since the learn-to-camp program began in 2011, the centennial of the founding of Canada’s first national park, Mr. Jager said the use of Parks Canada’s campgrounds has steadily risen. The program has also ballooned. From 10 events and 1,000 participants at its beginning, the program grew to 500 events involving 80,000 people last year.

While those numbers include a wide cross section of Canadians, Mr. Jager said participation has also involved new Canadians, including refugees. He recalled a middle-aged couple who had immigrated from China arriving for an overnight session at Toronto’s Rouge National Urban Park with relatives who had landed in Canada just that morning.

“A whole variety of people show up,” Mr. Jager said. “After one of the programs we did in Banff we had somebody write: ‘I love you, I love Parks Canada, I love Canada. I feel Canadian right now.’ ”

Trans-Canada

—Researchers have documented a young arctic fox’s 2,175 mile stroll, largely over sea ice, from Norway to Nunavut.

—A science fair project by a Calgary student wound up as a paper in a medical journal.

—Scott Tobias offers his picks for Netflix viewers in Canada this month. There’s more than just “Stranger Things 3.”

—A Canadian freelance journalist now at the Women’s World Cup in France is among those trying to deal with broader gender issues surrounding the tournament and is receiving social media grief for her efforts.

—A former industrial area in Toronto has suddenly become hip thanks to a new art museum. But popularity has brought soaring real estate values that may destroy the area’s long time colony of artists.

Around The Times

—Eli Baden-Lasar, a young photographer who was conceived with sperm from a donor, set out to document his half siblings for an exceptionally large family portrait.

—Poet, singer, ruthless mass murderer: Joseph Stalin is also his hometown’s tourist draw.

—Isoko Mochizuki is a Japanese journalist who asks questions, a lot of them. That’s not how things are supposed to work in Japan.

—There are no formal leaders of the protests in Hong Kong, which this week led to an invasion of its legislature. But Roy Kwong, a lawmaker and romance novelist, has become a leading voice for moderation.

—Some artists in Britain say fossil fuel companies should have no role in supporting the arts in an era of climate change.

—Lee Iacocca, who died this week, brought the world the Mustang as well as the prone-to-exploding Pinto. Later he saved Chrysler in Windsor, Ontario, with production of the minivan, and expanded the company’s footprint to Brampton, Ontario, with the purchase of American Motors. His secret, as Keith Bradsher wrote in an appreciation, was fusing his personal identity with the corporation’s.

A native of Windsor, Ontario, Ian Austen was educated in Toronto, lives in Ottawa and has reported about Canada for The New York Times for the past 15 years. Follow him on Twitter at @ianrausten.

We’d love your feedback on this newsletter. Please email your thoughts and suggestions to [email protected]. And if you don’t receive this every Saturday morning, please subscribe to the email newsletter version.

Source: Read Full Article