Leap of Faith |
Whether Darrel Bossert’s Rocky Mountain Zip Line succeeds depends not just on its own merit, but on the province’s willingness to make the jump to adventure tourism
by Bob Covey
Hitched to a steel cable strung like a clothesline high above the treetops, 30-year-old Kenrick Miller is harnessed and ready for his inaugural zip line flight. A soldier from CFB Edmonton heading back from some R&R in nearby Jasper, Miller stares straight ahead at the Rocky Mountain horizon. Long, even breaths betray a case of the butterflies. Behind him, zip line owner Darrel Bossert grins and raises a walkie-talkie. “We’re all ready for liftoff up here,” the 50-year-old says to his assistant 1,200 feet down the slope at the end of the line. “I’m making him hot!”
“Up here,” is the sloped rooftop of Bossert’s log home, perched on this hill overlooking the Yellowhead Highway, 10 minutes west of Hinton. “Making him hot,” means unhooking Miller – who’s laid down $50 for this experience – from a safety tether, freeing him to begin the run to the edge of the roof. A moment later, Miller is stretched out underneath the cable like a superhero, zipping 15 metres above the ground at 50 kilometres an hour. Bossert whoops approvingly. Then he indicates to Kayley Dillon, who just watched her fiancé take flight, that she’s next.
“Five seconds after you’re off the ramp, your world changes,” Bossert assures her.
The travel industry would call people like Miller and Dillon “accomplisher” tourists – thrill-seekers willing to pay for extreme forms of adventure. Bossert, who’s worked in mines, mills, oilfields and most recently as a carpenter to raise the $75,000 he’s invested in his zip line, says the opportunity those travellers represent has bypassed this region for years. He wonders why. The area has mountains, rivers, lakes, sand dunes, canyons and trails, but apart from a smattering of campgrounds, horse outfitters and guest ranches, the area’s tourism potential remains largely untapped. He’s not convinced it’s because of a lack of entrepreneurial spirit.
Despite putting out his “Jasper Adventure Zip Line” shingle for the first time in the summer of 2008, almost 18 years have passed since he began making inquiries to the government about a long-term lease on this 11-hectare, highway frontage parcel of land. Back then, Bossert dreamed of helping open the Yellowhead corridor between Jasper National Park and the town of Hinton to adventure tourism. After finally gaining his own tourism foothold, he now dreams of developing his facility into an off-grid eco-lodge, complete with climbing wall, hot tub and an interpretive centre to promote wind sports other than zip-lining. (His own beloved pastime is hang-gliding.) Whether any of it will happen depends mostly on whether provincial government departments will pave the way to what he considers badly needed economic diversification.
He’s not alone. While currently dependent upon a resource-based economy, local community leaders are realizing new industries can, and must, be supported. Like Bossert, they’re beginning to see the potential of the Yellowhead corridor as a destination, rather than a throughway to Jasper or British Columbia.
“I’ve always known the potential of this corridor for tourism,” says Bossert, who was raised in Jasper.
“There’s a huge market out there,” he adds. “What’s the vision for our future here?”
Within the corridor, Crown land is almost exclusively in Alberta’s forested “green zone.” Except for a handful of identified tourism “nodes,” land here is reserved for resource extraction, not necessarily commercial development. The Alberta Tourism Recreational Leasing process is designed to assist the development of commercial tourism or recreational facilities on public lands. It can be a difficult process.
“If you’ve got a well to drill, a tree to harvest, or coal to dig, have at it,” says Glenn Taylor, mayor of Hinton. “But if you want to encourage someone to come in and ride a quad, take pictures, climb a hill or go camping, it becomes much more difficult.”
