Nut Point Campgrounds is located minutes out of La Ronge. (Derek Cornet/larongeNOW Staff)

By Derek Cornet

provincial park

Major LLRPP campgrounds closed for remainder of 2020

Sep 14, 2020 | 3:10 PM

Employees of the Lac La Ronge Provincial Park (LLRIB) are in the midst of closing down the three major campgrounds in the region.

Nut Point, Nemeiben Lake and Wadin Bay Campgrounds all closed at the end of September long weekend and Park Manager Natasha Merriman said they’ve been busy closing the facilities and blowing out the waterlines in preparation for winter. The five other campgrounds in the LLRPP including Churchill River, Devil Lake, Little Deer, MacKay Lake and Missinipe will remain open until the end of the month.

All remaining campgrounds, with the exception of Missinipe which includes showers, are non-electrical.

“Overall, with visitation, we weren’t too far off from last year even with the delayed start and with COVID being a big factor,” Merriman said. “Lots of people still came out and enjoyed the park. We had enhanced cleaning measures the staff did very well at and, overall, I think we had a good year.”

There were two new additions to the park in 2020 such as a public phone in Nut Point to book reservations, as well as the introduction of park entry permits. A spokesperson noted revenue raised by the sale of park passes will be used for improving roads, visitor reception centres, trails and more.

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“We’ve had the reservation system for a number of years now, so people are fairly used to that,” Merriman said.

Throughout the summer, Merriman also explained she witnessed a lot of local residents in the park for day use or for camping. She believes not as many people were travelling due to the pandemic and used the opportunity to stay closer to home.

At the Lac La Ronge Visitor Centre in Air Ronge, Manager Judy Hanke also mentioned there were many local people stopping by. She added many of the out of town visitors this year primarily came from other parts of Saskatchewan or Alberta.

“People were just curious and maybe it was something that wasn’t necessarily on their bucket list until now,” Hanke said about why people came to the LLRPP. “I’m hoping it will stay busy. I’m hoping people aren’t travelling out of the province and I hope they will come up and check the North out including La Ronge and area in the winter.”

The approximate number of tourists who visited the park, however, is unknown as Hanke didn’t require visitors to sign a guest book this year due to the coronavirus. In normal years, it’s common for tourists to come from throughout Canada and other countries as well.

– With files from Alison Sandstrom.

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derek.cornet@jpbg.ca

Twitter: @saskjourno