As a fellow Canadian - welcome to the forum btw, let's see if I can help a bit.
I have to come back to Ontario for six months every year as a retiree to keep all my pension money in place and to satisfy the requirements of the provincial health care rules. Besides that, the US will only let me stay for 6 months anyways...
And yes, it's much more difficult to find cheap accommodations whether it's an RV park or whatever, in Canada.
Yes, there's dispersed camping, it's called crown land. It's not to be found anywhere near any urban centers where you can expect to find work. It's also hard to camp on in most places unless you canoe or hike in, obviously not practical for a working person (or me). In the US, when forestry services are finished with an area they leave the roads in place and invite the public to use them. In Canada, the rules are a bit different. Each logging company has to put their own roads in place and then are legally required to decommission them when they're finished with an area. They block the roads off at the access entrance so that they can't be used. Don't ask and don't get me started on the thinking of that one...
What I'm doing because I don't need to work is this: I've found a park attached to an old motel that only wants a $1,000. a year for a site with water and electric. I won't be there for a year but the monthly rate is such that it's cheaper for me to pay the annual up front and be done with it. I'm fortunate that I can take the grand out of savings and then put some back each month. The place ain't pretty but it 's cheap, which works for me. Other parks in the same area want $1,400 to $1,600 for a season that runs from May 24 to our October Thanksgiving...thanks but no thanks.
That's not to say that it can't be done...out west would be more practical (outside of the greater Vancouver area which has horrendous rental rates for everything). If you ski, you could get hired on at a ski resort for the winter. I know one young man who works a golf course in the summer and a ski resort in the winter. Since both are seasonal jobs they don't expect him to stick around longer than a season. He's having the time of his life much to the dismay of his father who wanted him in university...
Basically it all depends on what type of work you can get and where. Keep in mind that you probably don't want to be living in a van during ski season. Some of the larger resorts offer low cost accommodations for their employees.
Or maybe you could find work that pays enough, say in 6 months, to be able to take the next 6 off. It will all depend on the lifestyle to which you would like to become accustomed. If a coffee a day at Timmies is on your list, the money has to come from somewhere.
