This winter the price of gasoline caught up with us and we decided to limit our travel. We had talked about camp hosting and I did some investigating. We signed up on Volunteer.gov, and several state camp hosting pages.
For the uninitiated camp hosting is trading volunteer work for a camp site and maybe some pay. The work can be staffing an entrance kiosk, cleaning bathrooms, picking up trash, light maintenance, or any other modestly skilled activities.
Our first gig was at McHenry Recreation Area on the Stanislaus River in Modesto. It is owned and managed by the Army Corps of Engineers. It is a day use only park and was a great way to start. Below is our site.
Our contract was for February, March and April. We had water, septic, electricity and an excellent site. We also had a storage shed to lock things up. Our job was to clean the picnic sites and interact with the visitors. We were supposed to work 20 hours each week but there really wasn’t that much to do. I used the blower and cleaned off the walkways weekly. We checked the bathrooms for toilet paper and messes. In general it was great. The only real downside is that the COE contracts out lots of work. In this case it was the bathroom cleaning and the contractor did a really terrible job and it embarrassed us since we were the public face. COE knew it was a problem but it was going to be very difficult to work through their paperwork. That was disappointing but everything else was great.
Our next, and current camp hosting is at Woodson Bridge State Recreation Area (SRA). This is in Northern California – just north of Chico. It is a small, 37 site, campground that is dry camping for all the campers, except us. Again, we were to work 20 hours per week, checking campsites to make sure the people had paid and were in the correct site, and answering questions they might have.
Below is what our site looks like.
We quickly added to the list of activities. We now clean the sites after folks leave, clean the fire pits, water the grass, mow, generally clean up, and light maintenance. Our contract was through the end of July but we extended it a couple of times and will be here until the end of October. We also plan to return here next April for the new season.
For November we are camp hosting at Sunset State Beach on Monterey Bay. We will be there for November, December, and January.
We are enjoying hosting very much and seem to have a knack for it. We will see if we are still so enthusiastic twelve months from now.
Stanislaus River
The dogs wading on Stanislaus River
Picnic for Maintenance and they invited us!
Riding the shovel
One of the picnic areas at Stanislaus
This winter the price of gasoline caught up with us and we decided to limit our travel. We had talked about camp hosting and I did some investigating. We signed up on Volunteer.gov, and several state camp hosting pages.
For the uninitiated camp hosting is trading volunteer work for a camp site and maybe some pay. The work can be staffing an entrance kiosk, cleaning bathrooms, picking up trash, light maintenance, or any other modestly skilled activities.
Our first gig was at McHenry Recreation Area on the Stanislaus River in Modesto. It is owned and managed by the Army Corps of Engineers. It is a day use only park and was a great way to start. Below is our site.
Our contract was for February, March and April. We had water, septic, electricity and an excellent site. We also had a storage shed to lock things up. Our job was to clean the picnic sites and interact with the visitors. We were supposed to work 20 hours each week but there really wasn’t that much to do. I used the blower and cleaned off the walkways weekly. We checked the bathrooms for toilet paper and messes. In general it was great. The only real downside is that the COE contracts out lots of work. In this case it was the bathroom cleaning and the contractor did a really terrible job and it embarrassed us since we were the public face. COE knew it was a problem but it was going to be very difficult to work through their paperwork. That was disappointing but everything else was great.
Our next, and current camp hosting is at Woodson Bridge State Recreation Area (SRA). This is in Northern California – just north of Chico. It is a small, 37 site, campground that is dry camping for all the campers, except us. Again, we were to work 20 hours per week, checking campsites to make sure the people had paid and were in the correct site, and answering questions they might have.
Below is what our site looks like.
We quickly added to the list of activities. We now clean the sites after folks leave, clean the fire pits, water the grass, mow, generally clean up, and light maintenance. Our contract was through the end of July but we extended it a couple of times and will be here until the end of October. We also plan to return here next April for the new season.
For November we are camp hosting at Sunset State Beach on Monterey Bay. We will be there for November, December, and January.
We are enjoying hosting very much and seem to have a knack for it. We will see if we are still so enthusiastic twelve months from now.
Stanislaus River
The dogs wading on Stanislaus River
Picnic for Maintenance and they invited us!
Riding the shovel
One of the picnic areas at Stanislaus
