CNRL - Horizon?

albertadave · #1 06-03-2013, 03:42 PM

Anybody work, or worked, there? I may have an opportunity up there, going for a site tour this week, and just looking for any thoughts, or insight, from anyone who's been there. Either for the company, or as a contractor. How's the camp? I heard they're building a new one. Thanks guys.

79ford · #2 06-03-2013, 04:33 PM

I have heard it is a well laid out site and camp is decent. Probably relatively less rank than suncor or syncrude. Leave your window open by accident overnight on some days at those places and you will have a rather ghastly smelling room when you wake up.

Swolf · #3 06-03-2013, 04:46 PM

I am at CNRL in Calgary and I think its a great company. I have been hear for over a year and am happy with the move.

Good Luck!

sheepguide · #4 06-03-2013, 04:49 PM

I've heard decent stuff from guys working the production side of things for CNRL but I'm sure not a big fan of sitting on their drilling projects.

Alberta83 · #5 06-03-2013, 04:50 PM

Camp there is disgusting. Actually all 3 of the camps there are brutal. Look up in the shower and you'll see the black mold on the roof. Food...there was many nights where I went hungry. Selection of food for lunches was pretty good though. My 2 cents. I'm sure some others will agree. Good luck. Scary place to work too. Less than 10 years old and it's already blown up a couple times.

sheepguide · #6 06-03-2013, 04:58 PM

The CNRL Primrose drilling camp was about the same! Was a pretty lame camp for the amout of money them projects bring in. Last winter I was there you pretty much had to wear you helly hansons to eat. I didn't have to sleep there but the boys bitched about their rooms stead

sillyak · #7 06-03-2013, 05:08 PM

People always bitch about camp. I've never understood. If the shower is gross wear sandals, big deal. I've always been able to put together a decent meal at every camp I've been to, from 30 man camps to 800. Maybe I'm just easy to please, but I stay in a lot of different camps all over.

sheepguide · #8 06-03-2013, 05:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sillyak

People always bitch about camp. I've never understood. If the shower is gross wear sandals, big deal. I've always been able to put together a decent meal at every camp I've been to, from 30 man camps to 800. Maybe I'm just easy to please, but I stay in a lot of different camps all over.

Stay in lots of camps as well. But if your a billion dollar company asking people to stay away from home to work for you the showers and living conditions best be in good order. Why should people settle for half azzed? Sure the food isn't always great but should be decent all the time. Other companies can run top camps why can't all of them.

Anyways back to the topic!

AdverseCity · #9 06-03-2013, 05:55 PM

I'm actually there right now, the camp is far from the worst I've been to. The food is not always restaurant quality but usually better than I cook at home, they also just put in a soft serve ice cream machine. The showers/washrooms are sometimes gross but that's only because of the previous user. They're shared washrooms, each bunk of up to 48 people has a community bathroom and 6 small lockable single washrooms with a sink, toilet and shower each. Bring some water shoes, sandals, etc and you're good. The guy who mentioned mold was probably talking about "Chelsea" camp which is the one I'm in now. It's 10+ years old and they had a mold issue in some bunkhouses 2-3 years ago. Those bunkhouses are now gone and the others have been renovated along with the main part of the camp. There's a nice gym, rec hall with pool, foosball, ping pong and a couple flat screens. There's a bar with pool, foosball, darts, big flat screens and $6.50 beers, Karaoke most weekends but no UFC events. No smoking rooms and you can't just smoke anywhere outside either, there's 4 smoke pits around camp and they're not always close.

There's actually three camps here, "Chelsea" and "Calumet" are pretty similar and mostly for tradespeople. "Mackay River" camp is mostly for office workers and low level executive style people, I've never been there but I here it's nicer.

That's about all I can think of, let me know if you have any specific questions. I'm working at the edge of the plant in a new construction zone so I can't really tell you much about work, it'll all depend on what area you're going to. Most places are similar but there's a few places to avoid, the cokers and plants 33 & 34 are not nice to work in. Good luck and don't forget to save some of the nice paychecks......

Fish along · #10 06-03-2013, 06:14 PM

Not sure but I think this was the old barge landing camp , it's just been moved there I believe, if so they were in bad shape but they fixed em up when they arrived , don't know about the food but I thought I heard someone say that it's not the greatest.Good luck tell us when you find out for sure.

Fish along · #11 06-03-2013, 06:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sheepguide

Stay in lots of camps as well. But if your a billion dollar company asking people to stay away from home to work for you the showers and living conditions best be in good order. Why should people settle for half azzed? Sure the food isn't always great but should be decent all the time. Other companies can run top camps why can't all of them.

Anyways back to the topic!

I hear you to me it's the most important subject , grub and showers,

Fish along · #12 06-03-2013, 06:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sillyak

People always bitch about camp. I've never understood. If the shower is gross wear sandals, big deal. I've always been able to put together a decent meal at every camp I've been to, from 30 man camps to 800. Maybe I'm just easy to please, but I stay in a lot of different camps all over.

30to800 hundred are small camps and should have good grub no excuse . It when you get into a 3 to 5 thousand man camps that's when the food gets dicey'

Fish along · #13 06-03-2013, 06:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by albertadave

Anybody work, or worked, there? I may have an opportunity up there, going for a site tour this week, and just looking for any thoughts, or insight, from anyone who's been there. Either for the company, or as a contractor. How's the camp? I heard they're building a new one. Thanks guys.

Not sure what the rooms are like but i don't think there's any air conditioning so it would be wise to bring along a good fan . Good luck.

lizardking83 · #14 06-03-2013, 06:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AdverseCity

I'm actually there right now, the camp is far from the worst I've been to. The food is not always restaurant quality but usually better than I cook at home, they also just put in a soft serve ice cream machine. The showers/washrooms are sometimes gross but that's only because of the previous user. They're shared washrooms, each bunk of up to 48 people has a community bathroom and 6 small lockable single washrooms with a sink, toilet and shower each. Bring some water shoes, sandals, etc and you're good. The guy who mentioned mold was probably talking about "Chelsea" camp which is the one I'm in now. It's 10+ years old and they had a mold issue in some bunkhouses 2-3 years ago. Those bunkhouses are now gone and the others have been renovated along with the main part of the camp. There's a nice gym, rec hall with pool, foosball, ping pong and a couple flat screens. There's a bar with pool, foosball, darts, big flat screens and $6.50 beers, Karaoke most weekends but no UFC events. No smoking rooms and you can't just smoke anywhere outside either, there's 4 smoke pits around camp and they're not always close.

There's actually three camps here, "Chelsea" and "Calumet" are pretty similar and mostly for tradespeople. "Mackay River" camp is mostly for office workers and low level executive style people, I've never been there but I here it's nicer.

That's about all I can think of, let me know if you have any specific questions. I'm working at the edge of the plant in a new construction zone so I can't really tell you much about work, it'll all depend on what area you're going to. Most places are similar but there's a few places to avoid, the cokers and plants 33 & 34 are not nice to work in. Good luck and don't forget to save some of the nice paychecks......

I am up here right now aswell. Its not that bad. The shared bathrooms are about the worst of it all.

Bennettcw · #15 06-03-2013, 06:34 PM

Always fun to read different opinions of camps. I've been working at horizon for almost six years, have been in camp (McKay) since Christmas, no complaints from me other than the lunches are the same day to day. Room is good, food is good, shower is hot and have never had a cleanliness issue. The AC blows cold and the heat hot in the winter.

Gyms are top notch, fair amount of things to do, floor hockey, basketball, shoot pool, darts, etc.

As for a company, I can't complain, they take good care of us.

Camp is what you make of it.

Bennett

albertadave · #16 06-03-2013, 07:35 PM

Thanks for the responses guys. Always good to hear a few different opinions. I guess I'll see when I head up there later this week.

just_dave · #17 06-03-2013, 07:55 PM

It looks like a good camp from their website.

Scroll down, look on the left side.

http://www.cnrl.com/operations/north...oil-sands.html

fortyseven · #18 06-03-2013, 08:38 PM

CNRL - Construct Now Repair Later
Worked there for a good few months. Beds are small, communal showers and toilets are disgusting - wear flip flops or you'll get athlete's foot.
Food isn't great, but isn't terrible. They had a reasonable selection.
The safety watch there are bottom-of-the-barrel stupid, lots of wannabee safety cops. If you have to do a confined space or an air job you're on your own - if something happened the safety watch sure as **** won't know what to do.
It's quite a ways north of Ft Mac, so expect a long drive if you're going into town for supplies after work. They have a bar on site (at least they still did when I was there) - stay away from it.

HyperMOA · #19 06-03-2013, 11:35 PM

Spent a year there. It is by far the worst camp that I have stayed at ever. I was there from 08 to 09 when pork prices dropped to nothing from the swine-flu epidemic. We ate pork 10 to 11 times per 14 day rotation. The food was awful. Most of the guys believe that they lace their food with laxatives because within 24 hours of arriving you made 3 or 4 trips to the toilet everyday. Within a day of getting home again and no problem. This was a problem that everyone I worked with agreed about. Also, the main camp with the Tim Horton's in it was far too close to their waste pond. So all night long all you hear is their duck cannons shooting off every 30 seconds. Annoying but you eventually get used to it. The other issue I had was it seemed I bunked where the drunks slept because every night at midnight they would stagger down the hall waking me up with their drunken yelling. The parking lot sucks, and it seems the guys that need to take their work truck on and off site everyday get stuck in the opposite side of the camp and because our vehicles move daily you have to park at the far end of the lot near the North American shop. Other than that though . . . .

Zulu9er · #20 06-04-2013, 06:04 AM

http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/1167...ake-think-tank

Though I could not find one specifically for CNRL, this pretty much sums up their camp. I stayed at MacKay Camp two years ago for the coker fire rebuild. The security up there is provided by very skinny people who could not make it as pirates in their own country around the horn of africa. Just as you get comfortable in your room, a letter is slipped under your door that says you have to go to housing and get a new room because of "operational requirements", so basically you get shifted around to the glee and giggles of housing. Also, you need to speak 7 languages up there, as its the united nations of employment. Oh, and don't DARE look sideways or make a less than politically correct statement to the housing pukes,, they will shut your card off, and then your on the mat, and possibly get kicked offsite. After 5 moves to different rooms because of "operational requirements", in 3 weeks, I had enuff, flipped housing my ID card and the finger, and left.