Cavendish Music Fest Wants RV Campground

More than 40,000 people attended the Cavendish Beach Music Festival in 2009. (CBC)

  Organizers of the Cavendish Beach Music Festival have applied to set up a campground near the festival site.

The campground would be the size of 10 building lots and would accommodate 80 to 100 campsites, complete with an access road, hook-ups and a washroom facility.

Jeff Squires, a spokesman for the festival, said the campground would help event staff.  "What we're finding this year is we've been inundated with the demand for people who want to put their fifth wheel [trailers] and their RVs close to the site because they are working there for a week to 10 days," he said.

Squires said the campground would be used by people working at the festival, with leftover spaces made available for the public to rent.

The property would have to be rezoned for the campground to go ahead and there are plans to use it beyond the festival weekend.  While some people in the area have no problem with the campground proposal, other neighbours expressed concern.  Norm and Paula Hansen have a cottage near the site.  Having a campground there with 100 sites would create a lot of problems, I think. Just young people drinking and partying," Norm Hansen said.  I think once it has been rezoned, then anything goes there and we're going to have some problems down the road and we did not buy this property with that in mind," Paula Hansen said. "We thought it was cottages only going up there. That's what we were told."
 
A public meeting on the rezoning application will be held on June 2 at the North Rustico Lions Club hall.

The Cavendish Beach Music Festival runs from July 7 to 11.

SOURCE: CBC NEWS

Family Still Missing After Sinkhole Swallows Home!

A Canadian couple and two young children are missing after their home collapsed into a massive sinkhole near Montreal.

VIDEO SOURCE:  CNN 

A family dog has been found alive at a rural property in Saint-Jude, Que., where the land gave way Monday night and swept away a house and several cars.

Police say a family of four has not been heard from since the geological incident caused part of the house to sink near the Yamaska River.

It created a large crevice, damaged a two-lane road and prompted the evacuation of five other houses in the town located about 50 kilometres northeast of Montreal.

"It's a pretty gigantic crater," said Francois Gregoire, a spokesperson for the fire department.

The incident, which happened during the time that the Montreal-Pittsburgh playoff game was being broadcast on TV, remains under investigation by officials.

Still missing are a couple -- an electrician and a daycare worker -- and two young girls who live inside the house.

CTV's Genevieve Beauchemin said police have tried to call the man's cellphone, but have only heard it ringing inside the house.

"He apparently carries his cellphone all the time with him. He has it on his belt, even when he is within the house," Beauchemin told CTV's Canada AM from Saint-Jude on Tuesday morning.

"So, what they tried to do overnight is to call that cellphone to try to see whether he would answer that and they could hear the cellphone ring at times, but there was no one who picked up. No signs of life."

CTV Montreal's Cindy Sherwin said the man had lived in the area for much of his life. 

He has grown up here and been in this area for generations," Sherwin reported Tuesday from Saint-Jude. "His father lived on a plot of land just nearby."

Sherwin said police have not revealed where they found the family's dog on Tuesday morning.

Rescuers have made several attempts to make their way inside the house, having to call off two overnight attempts because of safety concerns.

On Tuesday morning, a third attempt was set to go forward.

Family members have gathered near the house as they wait to find out the fate of their loved ones.

"They said that they will stay here all day until there is news -- either way," Beauchemin said.

At the Aux Quatre-Vents elementary school in Saint-Jude, students heard what had happened at the house where one of their fellow students lived.

Principal Chantal Gagnon said the school had never been so quiet.

"We told them that since there is no official word we can still cross our fingers," she said.

"We told them that in times like these we have to take care of each other."

Mayor Yves Bellefeuille said residents are in shock after seeing what happened to the house in Saint-Jude.

He said counselors will be made available to people who need help.

Click here to watch News Story of Missing Family & Family Dog Found

SOURCE: CTV News

With files from The Canadian Press

Relatives of a family of four who are missing after their house was swept away in a landslide take care of Foxy, the family dog that was recovered by rescuers, Tuesday, May 11, 2010 in St. Jude, Que. (Ryan Remiorz / THE CANADIAN PRESS)

A Quebec family of four was missing Tuesday after a massive sinkhole swallowed their home, according to reports from CNN affiliates. Authorities said the home fell 30 feet into the hole when it opened around 9:30 p.m. Monday. A couple in their 40s and two children, ages 9 and 11, were believed to be inside, according to a report by CNN affiliate CBC news. 

The couple’s vehicles were seen outside the house and efforts to reach them by cell phone were unsuccessful, authorities told the CBC.

"We tried to reach them by phone, because the father always wears his cell phone on him," Quebec Provincial Police Sgt. Ronald McKinnis told CBC. "The firefighters heard the cell phone, but they weren't able to [locate] it."

The hole was about 500 yards long and forced the evacuation of five other homes in the town of Saint-Jude, in a rural area near the Yamaska River about 40 miles northeast of Montreal, CNN affiliate CTV reported.

McKinnis told the CBC that the hole was first reported by a truck driver whose rig fell into it Monday night. He suffered only minor injuries, McKinnis said.

Search-and-rescue dogs were being called in to help the search, according to a report in the Montreal Gazette, and a helicopter was circling the area looking for signs of movement.

SOURCE:  CNN

Nudist Camp in Canada Goes Clothed After 40 Years

By ROSS ROMANIUK, QMI Agency

Former president Bob Mogliore looks out over the pool at Crocus Grove Nudist community. (QMI Agency file photo)

WINNIPEG - No more will everyone just hang out at a Manitoba nudist campground, as the park's owners try to better cover their costs by limiting their exposure to hefty water improvement bills.

After more than four decades of a "clothing-optional" attitude, what's been known as Crocus Grove Campground is changing its name this month to keep in step with a shift away from nudity among its users.

The newly named Sandhill Pines RV Park and Campground, about 40 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg, is requiring campers to begin wearing clothes when out and about at the facility, so that its owners can try to attract more customers and maintain their site's viability.

"It's too bad that it's had to go this route. That's just the way it's happened," Susan Ryynanen, who owns the park with husband Ray, said Thursday.

"We've had declining numbers in terms of clothing-optional campers, and we have to do something differently."  

The 60-campsite park is asking users and guests to wear clothes for the first time since it opened in 1969. The owners say it's because of new federal and provincial regulations requiring that facilities like private campgrounds chlorinate their tap water and undertake related engineering studies. 

It's going to be between $15,000 and $50,000, depending on the size of the campground, to comply," explained Susan. The Rynnanens had continued to allow nudity since purchasing the park in the Rural Municipality of Brokenhead more than three years ago.

Because their revenue potential is "extremely limited" by appealing to a naturist niche market, Ryynanen said, it's necessary to woo a wider array of campers.

"We just have to cope with the additional costs, and maintain the same size of campground," she added at the park on Provincial Road 317, where the couple live.

"So we need to go public and expand our horizons."

To distance the park from the nudity image, she said, they're using advertising and signage under the Sandhill Pines name and "don't have any affiliation with Crocus Grove at all any more."

The end of Crocus Grove's nudity, however, doesn't mean campers can't go naked anywhere in that region east of Lake Winnipeg. Ryynanen pointed out that the Patricia Beach area, a short drive north, continues to maintain a "clothing-optional" section along the lake.

The shift doesn't appear to be steering users away.

After talking to campers who have regularly used the park, Ryynanen said about 98% have indicated they'll hang around -- even if not hanging out.

"They understand. They're here because they love camping," she said.

"Everybody is sad and disappointed that we can't maintain the clothing-optional status, but the reality is that the big draw here is camping and being out in nature. It's a bit of a change, but not a complete change."

Posted in CNEWS Across Canada