A repeat of my 2018 stay at the Needles Campground in Canyonlands National Park likely will have to wait until 2020/Kurt Repanshek

Editor's note: This updates with response from recreation.gov's "escalation" desk, and includes terms of contract Booz Allen Hamilton negotiated.

Securing a campsite in a national park is not always an easy endeavor, and, unfortunately, recreation.gov does not always help.

The other day I searched for an available site at the Needles Campground (aka Squaw Flat Campground) in Canyonlands National Park in southeastern Utah. This is one of the best campgrounds in the Southwest. There are just 26 individual sites set amid the glorious redrock splendor of Canyonlands' Needles District. The sites are well spaced and offer a measure of solitude you don't always find in national park campgrounds, the restrooms are well kept up and even offer wash basins to do your dishes, and the night skies are wonderfully dark for star gazing.

The trick to landing a site, of course, is to start six months before you want to visit. My bad. I waited until six weeks out. Still, using recreation.gov to get a site was akin to hitting a moving target. First there were available sites, then there weren't. When I saw three consecutive dates in early April I wanted to go after, I tried to log into the site to snag them. It didn't like my email or password, so I created a new account. Sadly, it didn't like that new account it even after it verified it:

Are you sure you have the right email and password? Please double check your email and password, and try again. You can also click the links below to sign up for an account or reset your password. -- recreation.gov

I tried calling the folks at recreation.gov...and the recorded voice told there as a 43-minute wait time. So I tried the "chat" option. After a short wait, an agent chimed in to inquire what I needed. After I explained my dilemma, I was told my log-in issues could be solved by one of their agents ... if I called the reservations number.

See where this is going?

Is this the best way to run a reservation system for a sprawling system of some 100,000 campsites spread across the National Park System, U.S. Forest Service, and U.S. Bureau of Land Management. It's a timely question to ask, as last fall the reservation system was taken over by Booz Allen Hamilton, which Outside Magazine described as a "management consultant giant..." and which no doubt demonstrated its ability to handle the job when the contract came up. Under the terms of that ten-year contract, which kicked in October 1, Booz Allen Hamilton is being paid $182 million.

Giant they might be, but are they big enough or keen enough to manage this far-flung system? Supposedly one of the requirements for landing the contract was that Booz Allen Hamilton had to offer real-time reservation status. That might explain my experience with the "now you see them, now you don't" available campsites. They come and go as folks reserve a site, and then cancel their reservation. Ok, I get it. But there's more to running a reservation system than offering a tracking system that many others in the travel and dining industries long ago mastered. Operating a system that works, for instance.

Those behind the recreation.gov's call-in reservation system realized they wouldn't always have enough agents to handle call loads, and so designed the system to allow you to leave your phone number and they'd call you back...without you losing your place in line. I took that option, and within about 10 minutes got a call ... from a recorded voice that told me an agent would be with me shortly.

While I waited, I took another spin around recreation.gov's page for Canyonlands. A huge problem is that they haven't yet loaded maps of campgrounds, at least not those at Canyonlands, and so you can't look at the site you're being offered. Is your chosen site next door to the restrooms, and so you might have more foot traffic than usual day and night? How close to trailheads is it? Is there shade? Where are the water spigots? (I would come to learn that when Booz Hamilton got the recreation.gov contract, they had to build the system from scratch. They couldn't take what the previous company was using. But still, there are scads of park maps out there, including maps of campgrounds. Shouldn't a "management consultant giant" be able to fine-tune those rather quickly? Or pay someone to?)

After sitting on hold for eight minutes, not a long time, an agent tried to help me sort out my log-in credentials. He couldn't, even after verifying my email was in their system and walking me through a password reset (not that it's complicated, but he was trying to be helpful). No luck. Instead, he said he woud have to "escalate" my issue to a higher power. But he didn't know when -- In an hour? Later today? Tomorrow? Next week? -- or how -- email? phone call? text? carrier pigeon? -- I would be contacted. He also didn't know if they worked weekends, and didn't have any contact phone numbers for me to resort to. And while he told me that, those three available nights I wanted vanished.

Not that it matters, since I can't log in to reserve them.

A tech from the escalation team called back Monday morning, roughly 24 hours after my unhappy experience. After 10-15 minutes on the phone with him, during which I shared my browser screen so he could try to diagnose the problem...he was at a loss. His suggestion, while he consulted with others, was that I create a new account once again, but with a different email address. Or I could call their reservations line and hope that I get connected with someone before the sites and dates I want vanish.

That's my recreation.gov story. What's yours?