Camping The Great Divide Campground in Northern New Jersey
Camp New Jersey: I’m talking with Jan today. She’s the Director at The Great Divide Campground in New Jersey. Jan, why don’t you get us started by giving a little bit of history about The Great Divide Campground?
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Jan: The Great Divide Campground was purchased in May of 2012 by Carmine and Lisa Turella. They had been lifelong campers and were looking for a campground of their own. They were seasonal campers at another campground and, you know, were looking to purchase a campground of their own, and they were lucky enough to meet up with a company named – forgive me; I can’t remember the name of the company, but I could always find out that detail for you – who helps people find campgrounds. And Carmine had some specific requirements for where the campground had to be and how large, what size, what price, and Dan was able to find him a campground with those parameters. And it was definitely rundown, needed a lot of work and a lot of improvements, but we opened right after they purchased in May of 2012.
Camp New Jersey: Okay. And what types of camping do you offer there?
Jan: We do tent camping. You know, tent primitive camping. Tent sites with water and electric. We have RV sites with full hook-ups for water, electric, and sewer. We also do seasonal camping, where people come and they leave their trailers for the whole season and they pay one seasonable fee. And then we also do things like day guests for people that just living the neighborhood and they want to come and use the pool for the day.
Camp New Jersey: Okay. And what would you say are the most popular activities for guests at that campground?
Jan: We have a ton of theme weekends. Every weekend is a different theme weekend. We usually have live music every weekend. Tons of events for kids. We have a heated pool. We have a three-acre lake that people fish in, and they also do paddleboats and rowboats. And we have a barn that used for events with a good bonfire and an arcade in the barn. We also have an outdoor pavilion that we use for meeting and gathering. We have people that come and rent it for picnics.
Camp New Jersey: Okay, fun. The barn sounds like a blast.
Jan: Yeah, the barn’s great.
Camp New Jersey: So, if I was staying there for an extended period of time and I wanted to venture outside of the campground, what are some of your favorite attractions in that area that you might recommend?
Jan: There’s a couple different theme parks. We have the Land of Make Believe that’s nearby. Wild West City. There’s the Tomahawk Water Park. We’re also not too far from Mountain Creek. There’s a lot of nice, kind of cute towns in the area, like shopping at Lafayette and New Hope. And you know, people usually like to go to sometimes there are events at the Sussex County Fairgrounds. And there’s a lot of hiking and fishing in the area. A lot of State Parks.
Camp New Jersey: Okay, great. Two more questions for you, Jan. If you could spend just one hour at The Great Divide Campground in New Jersey, how would you spend your time there?
Jan: Ooh, that’s a tough one. You know, for me, personally, I think I would like to spend it sitting by the pool.
Camp New Jersey: Nice.
Jan: In the sun.
Camp New Jersey: Relaxing.
Jan: Yeah. And we also have a fully stocked camp store, where we do things like pizza and hot pretzels. And we have kind of an old school slushy machine that people love.
Camp New Jersey: Oh, fun.
Jan: And you know, lots of fun camping stuff and candy for the kids.
Camp New Jersey: Okay. And last question: if you could spend just one night at The Great Divide Campground, which specific site would you stay at and why?
Jan: Hmm. There’s so many great ones, but I would say I would probably pick A20. It’s a very nice, secluded site. It’s a very large area. There’s a little custom deck on the site. It’s kind of down at the end of a road, so you get a lot of nice privacy and a lot of kind of room and, you know, room to park your car.
Camp New Jersey: Perfect. Well, thanks for that tip, Jan, and thank you so much for taking some time out of your day to tell us a little bit more about The Great Divide Campground in New Jersey.
Jan: Thank you.
