New Michigan St Park etc & boat slip reservation system

[travelnutz]

Beginning Nov 1,2, and 3 this fall Michigan will install a NEW reservation system for the State Park CG's, lodging, mini cabins, rustic cabins, yurts, modern lodges, state forest CGs, boat harbor slips at the many state harbors. Complete with photo's of the camp sites. It will be DNR controlled and based in the State of Michigan in Ann Arbor and to be run totally within the state. About time!

Good riddance to the old system and it's problems that was based in a far away state and was so lacking!

Below is one cut and paste story from our local newspaper today:


Michigan launching new campground reservation system


The state Department of Natural Resources plans to launch a new reservation system for state park camping, lodging and harbors in November.

AP Wire Lansing Sep 20, 2013

As part of the transition, the central reservation system opens Nov. 1 for state park lodging, including camper cabins, mini-cabins, rustic cabins, yurts and modern lodges, the DNR announced this week. Those sites typically have a one-year reservation window.

On Nov. 3, the system opens to facilities with a six-month reservation window, including campsites at state parks and select state forest campgrounds and slips at state harbors. For stays with an arrival of Nov. 1 or 2, campsites will be available at parks on a first-come, first-served basis.

Several enhancements are planned, including the ability to search by region, check availability at more than one park at a time and view photos of each campsite prior to making a selection. Customers also won't need to navigate through as many screens before making a reservation.

"We've spent a great deal of time listening to the many suggestions offered by our customers on ways to make our reservation system more user-friendly and practical," Denise Gruben, DNR reservation system contact manager, said in a statement.

The DNR Parks and Recreation Division has contracted with Camis USA Inc., for the reservation system, which includes a call center in Ann Arbor and servers in the Detroit suburb of Southfield.

[JRS___B]

GordonThree - This is just a wild guess, but the current system only takes "site specific" reservations through a certain cutoff date. After that date the default is to show all sites as "unavailable", because technically at that point no site can be reserved by site number. It becomes first come, first served.

I ran into this before trying to reserve the same site for 2 weeks. It kept telling me that my site was only available for a part of the time period I wanted. So I tried another site, and got the same answer.

Eventually I figured out that none of the 160 or so sites were available for the full two weeks because the last three or four days of the 14 day period I wanted came after that cutoff date for site specific reservations.

Again, just a guess.

[JRS___B]

The "non-refundable" $8 as to discourage people from making reservations that they have little or no intent of honoring.

I believe there is also a $5 fee for changing sites within a park after you arrive, for those people who are never totally satisfied with their site and keep moving every time a "better" site becomes available.

[GordonThree]

Oh this sounds great. I noticed the old system was not being updated when I tried to find some spots mid-August and again the past few weekends. Now I know why!

Three CG's in a row were reporting almost every site being reserved, and when I got there, the opposite was true, the CGs were ghost towns.

[travelnutz]

We'd only used the old reservation system 2 times while it was in force. Once last year when we wanted 2 sites next to each other and this summer when it was supposedly close to booked up. My wife had no problems but she said she had to go from page to page and we ended up taking a site we were familiar with as we couldn't remember what the other sites looked like. Site photos will make a big difference and being more user friendly isn't all bad either. So even though we have no real problems either, many have reported hugh problems with the old system.

I also agree that an $8 rservation charge for a one night stay is very high while an $8 charge spread over a 10-14 day stay isn't that much at all. That's why we almost never get a reservation and have always gotten a site anyway or at worst, in another MI state park nearby as there are about 100 with CG's. We seldom stay more than 3-5 days in one park in the summer or fall months and try not to use the popular SP's in the summer months as we are retired and can RV anytime after the kids are back in school and families can't.

[mister_d]

LOVE the idea of adding photos like so many state parks around the country do. Besides that, I never had a problem with the current system. The idea of searching multiple campgrounds for a date sounds intriguing.

[bobcatcharlie]

The only issue I have is the reservation fee. $8 for a $24 site is a huge markup, if needed for one night only. During the season it's many times a must. Have used it for many years with few problems.

[golfknut]

I will appreciate the campsite photos, not so much for the parks we visit annually, but when visiting parks new to us.

I didn't care for the present system at first but have become very comfortable with it.
The only issue I have is the occasional "crashing" I experience when trying to get a site at the most popular state parks for a mid-summer stay. I'm not convinced any system will fix that issue. And I know it won't make getting a site at those parks during those times any easier. When there is such a huge demand for a relatively small number of sites it's never going to be pretty.

[JRS___B]

Just an after thought, but I never had a problem with the old system in terms of the basics, like making or canceling a reservation.

[travelnutz]

JRS & B,

Yes, the very high cost of automotive fuel is hurting travel in so many parts of our country and people tend to travel less distance because of it. The U.P. is a long way for much of the RVing population but it's so well worth the cost. It's over 400 miles one way just to Muskallonge SP by way of Tahquamenon Falls/M-123 for us but that has never stopped us and won't. We do the trip a min of once a year. Sometimes 2-4 times a year.

The fall leaf trip is a MUST for us for over 30 consecutive years now but we don't just go as far as Muskallonge SP but go on to Copper Harbor, the Porkies, and usaully to the Wisconsin border and work our way back home on the south side of the U.P. over the Big Mac Bridge again. So that's a 1600 mile driving round trip alone. So happy we have a Duramax with it's high MPG's with the Lance TC or our Carriage CarriLite 12,800 lb loaded 5th wheel. Actual planning for the years ahead when you're younger sure does payoff bigtime!

We aren't happy with the price of fuel either but it won't stop us from taking our many various trips each year as we know that some day we'll be subterranean and want to do as much as we can while still vertical and able to. It's like: Now or never! Can't go back and do what you had missed!

We live on Lake Michigan west of Grand Rapids and our tourism here where we live has not suffered from the fuel prices and continues increasing and setting new highs every year. On a track to hit the 7 million mark this year and that's after a record setting very cold extremely wet spring. Not bad! Of course, where we live is so much closer to the 35 million population within 250-300 miles and that helps.

There are many ways for RV'ers to cut costs when traveling and also save wasted money when home so they will have more means for traveling sensibly to the many places they really want to visit. It's all up to the individual person or family as to how much they want to do something!

We just hosted a fellow RV'er couple/forum members from the Chicago area on friday and yesterday here at home and we're leaving for the U.P. in about a week and will be seeing several other rv.com forum members up there like we do each year.

If you have the will, there's a way! Not talking about getting the proceeds of someone elses "will" either...

[JRS___B]

travelnutz - you are totally correct on the spelling. That is the way it is spelled by the state of Michigan, even though it is pronounced "Muskellunge", like the fish. I noticed that the state of Michigan does have internet references for both spellings. That is, if you Google using my spelling you get to the correct site anyway.

I spend 5 weeks a year there since I retired, and have been vacationing in the area for over 25 years. They really keep the campground maintained. I have seen guys cleaning the restrooms at 10 pm.

Maybe the new website will help their business.

The high price of gasoline started hurting tourism in the U.P. back when it first hit $2.00 a gallon. And things did not get better as the price increased to $3.59 a gallon.

[Parrothead_Mike]

This is good news. I suspect that we will have to reregister and create a new user ID and password. I'll put this on my calendar. Thanks.

[travelnutz]

JRS & B,

They were doing the same at Burt Lake SP at Indian River when we were there only the guy was walking with a camera over his head perched ahead of him attached to a backpack with an aluminum frame. He could see the image on the LCD screen on the back of the camera so he knew what he was taking. His DNR pickup was parked at the bathouse and he was taking photos along the next CG road east of us. Didn't stay at our site long enough to see if he was going to take our site pic with us there as we had our TC on the truck and took our boat to the SP launching ramp for a day on the long Inland Waterway. You park your tow vehicle in the big lot at the launch ramp while the boats in the water.

BTW, it's "Muskallonge Lake State Park" up on Lake Superior north of the Tahquamenon Falls and Newberry. 18 miles east of Grand Marais. We go there for a few days almost every year during the colored leaf peeping time after camping at the Falls River Bend CG and will again in about 2 weeks. Excellent CG and it's gorgeous looking south across Muskallonge Lake with the brilliant colored trees reflecting on the glass smooth lake water.

[JRS___B]

travelnutz - They were taking pictures of each site at Muskellunge Lake State Park when I was there in June. As soon as someone pulled out, they would run over and snap some pictures. I am curious to see my site because they asked me to move my truck, but took the picture with my tent in the picture anyway. They must of had a tight deadline.

[travelnutz]

Locky,

News I got said it will cover about 300 Michigan DNR run CG's and boat harbors. Now think about how many campsites and boatslips are in those many locations and you get the idea how big a deal and difficult it was to do this new system's detailing. Many Michigan State Parks alone have between 250 and 500 campsites.