I do a lot of legal gold prospecting in Victoria, Golden Triangle mainly, and adjacent, in designated areas in National Parks and most State Forrests are also available under a Victorian 'Miners Right' and I have to say having been to other States like S.A where you have to pay, the Victorians go out of their way to help us and its ALL free..a call to State Forrests resulted in much literature,maps etc, camping areas, personal info on gold together with the Rangers card for that area inviting me to call him anytime, same with National Parks, pointing out the areas available for camping and those not available due to the threatened species Whoop Woop spiny yellow stick insect's abode or whatever..point is they could not have been more helpful and the tracks/unmade roads are maintained often, and even prospecting/forrest tracks are named....funny not one sign seems to get shot at,pushed over or graffitied once you get off the bitumen....Victorians local Councils and Gov realized a long time ago what the prospector/fossicker/bush walker Dollar means to their Country Towns....other States where I have been treated off handedly and actually discouraged could learn a lot from Country Victoria....and no I'm not a Victorian.....go the Maroons Wednesday night.....Hoo Roo
-- Edited by Golddetectornomad on Sunday 2nd of June 2013 09:18:14 PM
justcruisin01 said
10:14 PM Jun 2, 2013
I read with discust that the NSW NPWS are considering the adopting the Qld system of pre-booking on line & paying for campsites before your arrival.
So more of buying a pig in a bag, why would you want to book some thing unseen.
I see this as being another way of detering people from visiting these areas, Reminds me of situation where I had words with a socalled park ranger over the price increase that was not publisized, in his own words ,Quote; go th the caravan park over the road as we dont want people here.
He then tried to make out that they were going easy on the vehicle entry fee, of which we had our free pass. Upon checking with fellow campers they were all charged the vehicle entry fee, he was trying to worm his way out of the confrontation with me.
When we got back to a phone there was a call made to the head office area manager, I wont quote what was said but he was going to have his xyz kicked.
JC.
Gerty Dancer said
10:22 PM Jun 2, 2013
Remember being in Qld and found it just not possible to book online, their website wasn't working properly. We went anyway and found the good ole self-registration box still in use. This happened in a couple of places, I hope they have their system running better now.
Its all about saving money by not having to pay somebody to do the bookings.
Some NSW parks are quite highly priced, hope they don't increase it further, we really will be staying in a caravan park instead!
justcruisin01 said
10:33 PM Jun 2, 2013
Gerty Dancer wrote:
Remember being in Qld and found it just not possible to book online, their website wasn't working properly. We went anyway and found the good ole self-registration box still in use. This happened in a couple of places, I hope they have their system running better now.
Its all about saving money by not having to pay somebody to do the bookings.
Some NSW parks are quite highly priced, hope they don't increase it further, we really will be staying in a caravan park instead!
Not that we are going to any but I did have a look at their booking system to see what had to be done, & yep no go still.
GaryKelly said
11:01 PM Jun 2, 2013
When that bloke said "we don't want people here" who was he referring to as "we"? As far as I'm aware, national parks belong to the people - which means you and me.
Gerty Dancer said
11:14 PM Jun 2, 2013
Thats so Gary, but the rangers have more to do than clean campgrounds. I don't know why we cant adopt the NT and WA system of having volunteer campground hosts/caretakers, it seems a good system and keeps everybody happy.
bill12 said
11:54 PM Jun 2, 2013
Having volunteer caretackers can be a problem where the hoons and riffraff move in and the caretackers are callen on the keep the peace. This happened at MT Elliot , just sth of Townsville and we had to band together with the elderly caretaker as the hoons were going to bash him, just for the fun.A couple of campers and myself gave them an offer they couldn't refuse, and they collided with the copcar on the way out!That was a laugh.I think the reg box is a good way to go. Bill
valnrob said
01:48 AM Jun 3, 2013
My opinion only..... National Parks & Wildlife don't want people in there. They're more interested in keeping people out . Unless you hop crawl or slither you stay out.
oldboar said
01:52 AM Jun 3, 2013
Yep, for most of them, controlling tourists is far less upsetting than controlling feral animals.
Darrell & Sandra
EllenajoeL said
02:33 AM Jun 3, 2013
I can only comment (with knowledge) about the FAR NTH NSW Nat Parks region and its governance.......although I suspect similar events apply elsewhere
What has happened (here) is that the significant increase in visitors and, more specifically, their 'footprint'/costs on the NP charter (this is, the increase of attendant maintenance, much of it being previously unrequired; and the (crazy) increase in litigation claims by public vs state) combined with the decrease in actual $ provided by the Govt for dealing with these expenses, has resulted in
1. closures (either deliberate or indirect) of access
2. extra tariffs for those whom choose to go there
3. and a tangible decrease in employee morale, etc
All I would like to add to this discussion is...please dont shoot the messenger.
bill12 said
02:45 AM Jun 3, 2013
In QLD, when the present govt got in they slash the funding for Nat Park management, and consequently the rangers can only do so much.One the island where I live, they haven,t even got enough money to fuel their boat, and 70% of the island is Nat Park , and many bays are only acessable by boat.Pretty sad , really. Bill
Willow said
06:04 AM Jun 4, 2013
I recently travelled up to Cape Tribulation and prebooked sites at Goldsborough Valley (south of Cairns) and Noah Beach. (Cape Trib) In both cases there were other people staying on the site I had booked. No big problem as I found a spare site in each case. The trouble is neither of these camps had mobile phone reception for drive up visitors to make a booking. Self registration would have solved the problem. In my opinion National Parks need an urgent shake up.
glassies said
01:54 AM Jun 5, 2013
easy national parks just done want people in them ,same thing happened in america i remember john laws talking about it years ago on the radio saying they just dont want people in there very sad realy we cant even enjoy our own country ,same thing happened to the huts out west of kempsey we used to stay in the huts at daisy plains etc and they closed them down ,everybody took good care of them when they were there ,but alas they just stopped the camping there
The dog lady said
03:13 AM Jun 5, 2013
I think a lot of it does have to do with the cost of legal liability when half-wits blame the park for their injuries and the crazy courts award damages. But there does seem to be an element which believes that the park will be better off if there are no human visitors. Makes as much sense as the campers we had (I used to own a campground in FNQ with my late husband) who said that the world would be better off without humans. My response? Maybe, but who would care!
I do a lot of legal gold prospecting in Victoria, Golden Triangle mainly, and adjacent, in designated areas in National Parks and most State Forrests are also available under a Victorian 'Miners Right' and I have to say having been to other States like S.A where you have to pay, the Victorians go out of their way to help us and its ALL free..a call to State Forrests resulted in much literature,maps etc, camping areas, personal info on gold together with the Rangers card for that area inviting me to call him anytime, same with National Parks, pointing out the areas available for camping and those not available due to the threatened species Whoop Woop spiny yellow stick insect's abode or whatever..point is they could not have been more helpful and the tracks/unmade roads are maintained often, and even prospecting/forrest tracks are named....funny not one sign seems to get shot at,pushed over or graffitied once you get off the bitumen....Victorians local Councils and Gov realized a long time ago what the prospector/fossicker/bush walker Dollar means to their Country Towns....other States where I have been treated off handedly and actually discouraged could learn a lot from Country Victoria....and no I'm not a Victorian.....go the Maroons Wednesday night.....Hoo Roo
-- Edited by Golddetectornomad on Sunday 2nd of June 2013 09:18:14 PM
I read with discust that the NSW NPWS are considering the adopting the Qld system of pre-booking on line & paying for campsites before your arrival.
So more of buying a pig in a bag, why would you want to book some thing unseen.
I see this as being another way of detering people from visiting these areas, Reminds me of situation where I had words with a socalled park ranger over the price increase that was not publisized, in his own words ,Quote; go th the caravan park over the road as we dont want people here.
He then tried to make out that they were going easy on the vehicle entry fee, of which we had our free pass. Upon checking with fellow campers they were all charged the vehicle entry fee, he was trying to worm his way out of the confrontation with me.
When we got back to a phone there was a call made to the head office area manager, I wont quote what was said but he was going to have his xyz kicked.
JC.
Its all about saving money by not having to pay somebody to do the bookings.
Some NSW parks are quite highly priced, hope they don't increase it further, we really will be staying in a caravan park instead!
Not that we are going to any but I did have a look at their booking system to see what had to be done, & yep no go still.
Darrell & Sandra
I can only comment (with knowledge) about the FAR NTH NSW Nat Parks region and its governance.......although I suspect similar events apply elsewhere
What has happened (here) is that the significant increase in visitors and, more specifically, their 'footprint'/costs on the NP charter (this is, the increase of attendant maintenance, much of it being previously unrequired; and the (crazy) increase in litigation claims by public vs state) combined with the decrease in actual $ provided by the Govt for dealing with these expenses, has resulted in
1. closures (either deliberate or indirect) of access
2. extra tariffs for those whom choose to go there
3. and a tangible decrease in employee morale, etc
All I would like to add to this discussion is...please dont shoot the messenger.
In my opinion National Parks need an urgent shake up.
talking about it years ago on the radio saying they just dont want people in there very sad realy we
cant even enjoy our own country ,same thing happened to the huts out west of kempsey we used to stay
in the huts at daisy plains etc and they closed them down ,everybody took good care of them when they were
there ,but alas they just stopped the camping there
I think a lot of it does have to do with the cost of legal liability when half-wits blame the park for their injuries and the crazy courts award damages. But there does seem to be an element which believes that the park will be better off if there are no human visitors. Makes as much sense as the campers we had (I used to own a campground in FNQ with my late husband) who said that the world would be better off without humans. My response? Maybe, but who would care!