On Lake Mendocino, off SR 20 a few miles east of 101. Annoying access road with 6 or ten speed bumps, but a very pleasant place once you've been assigned your spot by the check-in. Nice, free showers! The bathroom lights are quite bright, so a spot that looks nice in the afternoon might be kind of annoying at night.
Conveniently located next to Interstate 5, which somehow adds to the experience. You can see the semis rocketing along less than a mile away, but you're in another world. There's a nice hike through the marshes and along a tiny creek, and a very nice auto tour with a viewing platform stop in the middle. Sometimes I do the drive then the hike, sometimes the hike then the drive. Sunset looking back across the marshes from the viewing platform can be spectacular.
Cedar Pass CG in Badlands NP was full on Friday night, so here I am. It is in the town of Interior, at the edge of the Badlands, so the name makes more sense than you would think at first. Six rows of sites, the hook-ups for the big boys are on the inside and the tent sites are on the edges. Some sites have picnic tables, some don't. I decided I'd rather be on the edge with an unimpeded view of the Badlands than in a couple of rows with a table. The shower was nice and very welcome. Things are well-worn but well maintained also. Nice place, and a godsend when the Park is full.
National park campgrounds with check in are the worst. The campground is by definition huge, or else they wouldn't pay a staff to check you in. It takes forever because they have to explain the world to each and every guest and it creates a high stress level that is the opposite of what you're there for. However ... once that's over, it's a nice campground! There three different hikes to take from the valley where the campground is back up to the mesa. There are free showers, wifi and food at the check-in place, which is pretty far from the campsites.
This place is super user-friendly. There is an RV parking area at the back of the lot, and another across the road behind the reservation gas station. The second one is more level but seemed a little sketchy. I am going for the first. Glad to be here! Wifi was dead for most of the evening, but when it came back it was pretty good. There are a couple of stations in the casino with free coffee and even a cappuccino machine! You can hear the surf at night when the traffic is gone. The ocean is right across the highway, complete with a bench on the bluffs to watch sunset. Sweet little fountain with colored lights to entertain your inner stoner. Nice, friendly place.
Infrastructure is all new they say. Pretty happening little spot on a warm November Sunday afternoon. Eight-ish vehicles there when I arrived. There's a bathroom and a viewing area at the parking lot. There were lots of birds right there - mostly pintails, widgeons and shovellers. Also in the distance snow geese, the other goose, a flock of cranes overhead, and across the road, a flock of swans! Then there's a short, 1/3 mile walk out to another viewing area. Pretty sweet little spot. On hte walk was a group of grazing curlews that were kind enough to not fly away as I walked pretty close. I thought I was doing just a drive-by on my way to the main Sacto NWR auto loop, but this was so cool I spent the afternoon here.
Expensive, but oh so cool, on the bluffs at Cardiff CA. The town is right across the highway, great bluff-waking for miles northward, Cardiff Beach and beach side restaurants southward. Mornings and evenings are often pretty gray and damp. Nice firepits.
Omigosh! Google has shrunk their map of Lake Mead so that Echo Bay is like 10 miles from the lake now! The water level must be really low!
Nine miles south of beautiful Utah 12. Yet another scenic red rock wonderland. Basin Campground is the main one, with a paved road, hookups and running water. This one is a short ways off on a gravel side road, pit toilet and no other amenities. But it's quiet and very pleasant.
busy but pretty quiet, very scenic. nature trail. a short hike past the swimming pond to a great sunset over non-swimming Sardine Lake, shining off the Sierra Buttes to the left.
Lovely campsites right off the busy highway, next to NWR water - either a small lake or a large pond. Idyllic except for the noise and headlights of the constant semis 300 yds away.
This is where you camp when Island in the Sky is full ... which it always it. The method is to stop here on the way in, nail down a site then continue on another 20-odd miles to the Grand viewpoint ... then come back.
Took me a bit of wandering down unmarked gravel roads to find the camping area, but I'm very happy I did. There's a toilet and a picnic table. Drive a little, there's boat access, a couple of trees, and a grassy area which I think is the official camping area, then the road wanders half-way around Lake 13. Nobody used the grassy area. The rain had made it a mosquito-infested bog. I parked at a wide spot in the road by the entrance, and at least one bunch of fishermen spent the night on the far side of the lake. Super nice place!
Nearest gas is > 80 miles in any direction. An unexpected valley full of reedy marshes in the middle of endless high country desert. There's little warm pool and bathhouse with two showers that run always forever. The whole thing is quite unexpected!
About 25 miles off the road to anywhere, but pretty cool once you're here. I'm here on a cold day in October and it's almost deserted. Bear Lake is beautiful
Odd place. Separate bathhouses for men and women, nudity required. Camping is available in glorified parking lot across the road overlooking the settlement pond. No potable water, must drive a couple of miles for that. Really interesting salt flats area at the edge of town. In the last couple of years a pair of restaurants have opened. And breweries!
Typical National Park campground, the parking pads aren't even close to level, the roads are very rough, but they're amazingly low cost and you are in a spectacular place! This is the place you go when you know the main part of the park will be full by 11. At the east end of gorgeous Two Medicine Lake, spectacular mountains all around.
A big shadeless rectangle of land on the top of a bluff overlooking the Pacific. The southernmost of three campgrounds at Westport Union Landing State Beach.
Your two choices are tent camping and parking lot. It's a small lot, and everybody but me was running their generators till 10. Whatever is special and interesting about this park is not apparent from the road.
On the east side of the lake, making for spectacular sunsets over the water every night. Very quiet and beautiful and delightful. The big north-south highway and train tracks are pretty close and carry big noisy trucks and trains respectively.
At 9,300', so a short season. A dusty, cramped, low-amenity national park campground that's in a REALLY cool place.