Backbone Rock Campground
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $10–$20Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 10All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 13 notices
In the agency’s own words
Backbone Rock Campground will open for the 2026 season on 4/27/26. The pavilion and vault toilets in the day-use area will open on 3/16/26. Backbone Rock is a small campground situated along the beautiful Beaverdam Creek at an elevation of 2,100 feet in northern Johnson County. This developed campground is popular with those visiting the nearby Backbone Rock, a tunnel originally blasted through the rock ridge for the railway. The creek side location with popular swim area and lush forest surroundings make Backbone Rock Campground particularly desirable during hot summer months. With 10 campsites and an adjacent large Civilian Conservation Corps- built reservable pavilion with lawn, Backbone Rock is a great option for a group to reserve the whole campground for retreats and other events. Keep reading
Recreation
Along with camping, Beaverdam Creek is stocked with trout. The Appalachian National Scenic Trail is accessed via the Backbone Rock Trail (#53).
Facilities
There are 10 single campsites, including two double sites within Backbone Rock Campground. The campground has flush toilets. Each site contains a table, fire ring and lantern holder.
Natural Features
Backbone Rock Campground is located along the beautiful Beaverdam Creek nestled in the mountains of the Southern Appalachians.
Nearby Attractions
The trailhead for the Backbone Rock Trail (#53) is approximately a quarter mile South of the campground on TN Highway 133. This trail is 4 miles and at the end of the trail is where it joins into the Appalachian National Scenic Trail (#1) Damascus, VA is approximately 5 minutes North of the campground. The Backbone Falls Trail (#198) is approximately a third of a mile South of the campground. This 0.4 mile loop trail takes you to the top of Backbone Falls.
What the agency tells you
Backbone Rock Campground will open for the 2026 season on 4/27/26. This campground does not have any Long-Term Camping programs.
There is no electricity/water/sewer site hook-ups at this facility. There is potable water within the campground.
Alcohol prohibited.
Everything else this campground posts · 10
All equipment must fit on the site pad. Vehicles park in developed areas only.
An RV counts as one of the two vehicles allowed at a site.
You are in Bear Country. Please adhere to the Cherokee National Forest Food and Refuse Storage Requirements. All food (unless actively being prepared and/or eaten), trash, and other scented items (hygiene products, pet food, etc) must be stored in a bear-resistant container (closed hard top vehicle or travel trailer) or suspended at least 12 ft. off the ground and 6 ft. from limbs. Please read the entire Food Storage Order located under the Facility Information tab and Additional Information section or by reading the Food Storage Order posted at the campground. Any campsites not in compliance will receive a ticket.
Check-out time is no later than 11 am EST on your departure day. You may check-in to the campground between 2 pm EST and 10 pm EST of your arrival date. If you have not checked-in before 2 pm EST the day after your arrival date, your site will be checked-out and will forfeit all fees.
Established quiet hours are between 10 pm EST and 7 am EST.
The two CCC-Era pavilions underwent historic renovations which were completed September 2024.
All pets must be on a 6' leash at all times. Owners must pick up after their pets, and all pet waste disposed of properly.
Don't Move Firewood: Help protect our forests! Prevent the spread of tree-killing pests by obtaining firewood at or near your destination and burning it on-site. Visit dontmovefirewood.org to learn more.
Use designated fire rings for all fires. Do not build additional fire rings. No burning plastic or other non-wood materials except local wood in fire pits and charcoal in grills.
It is your responsibility to read, know, understand, and follow all campground specific rules and regulations which are posted at the campground.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 10
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- 10
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets · Vault Toilets
- “…2026 season on 4/27/26. The pavilion and vault toilets in the day-use area will open on 3/16/26. Backbone… / …Rock Campground. The campground has flush toilets. Each site contains a table, fire ring and lantern…”
- Camp host
- On site
- recreation.gov lists “Host”
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Creek
- Backpacking
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Hunting
- Climbing
- Scenic drives
- Stargazing
- Swimming
- Wildlife viewing
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
Every site here is reservable, and the record lists none held back for anyone who drives up.
No availability snapshot inside the last 36 hours, so this page draws nothing rather than ageing a reading into fiction.
Watch for a cancellation
Full? Watch it.
One email when a night opens, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We read recreation.gov once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time a site in your window is free for the nights you asked for.
Scanners that check every few minutes exist, and most of them charge. This one is free, it reads the same calendar, and it won’t always be first.
Tell me when the season opens
Watch for the season to open
One email when the season goes on sale, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We check once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time the agency has that season on sale.
Scanners that check every few minutes exist, and most of them charge. This one is free, it reads the same calendar, and it won’t always be first.
We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.
Every line of the receipt · 13
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $10–$20 a night, plus one $8 recreation.gov reservation fee for the booking. A weekend here means Friday and Saturday night, booked once. Optional charges (an extra vehicle, a second tent, a dump-station fee) are listed separately and aren’t in this total.
Who keeps the booking fee
The agency’s own policy text says the reservation fee and the cancellation processing fee are “retained by the reservation service contractor”, and that a campground concessionaire will decline to refund them because “they did not receive these fees”. Recreation.gov is run under contract by Booz Allen Hamilton. What share of your booking fee the contractor keeps isn’t published in any federal dataset we can read, so we print no number for it. Our reporting on the contract →
How we know this receipt · 5
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
11 records · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 11 mapped sitesAll 11 records
The price is derived by CAMPANAC, not published per site: the per-night rate this campground publishes for each site’s own site type. 10 of the 11 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
Measured shade is NLCD Tree Canopy Cover 2024 (USDA Forest Service / MRLC) read at the site’s own coordinate, 27% canopy or more, and only for the sites the agency gave no Shade value. It never changes the agency’s own shaded count beside it.
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 01 | standard nonelectric | yes | 137 ft | 37 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 02 | standard nonelectric | yes | 137 ft | 78 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 03 | standard nonelectric | yes | 114 ft | 33 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 04 | standard nonelectric | yes | 114 ft | 16 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 05 | standard nonelectric | yes | 105 ft | 15 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 06 | standard nonelectric | yes | 105 ft | under 10 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 07 | standard nonelectric | yes | 104 ft | under 10 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 08 | standard nonelectric | yes | 103 ft | 38 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 09 | standard nonelectric | yes | 78 ft | 80 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | 10 | standard nonelectric | yes | 78 ft | 132 ft | $10–$20 |
| BACKBONE ROCK CAMPGROUND | Host | host pad | yes | 168 ft | 245 ft | $10–$20 |
The agency files 1 more record here that isn’t a site for the night. It names it a host pad. It’s in the table above, marked for what it is, and it isn’t counted as a site.
OpenStreetMap has no toilet mapped within 1 km of this campground, so no site here carries a toilet distance. That’s a gap in the map, not a finding about the campground.
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Jacobs Creek Campground (TN)11 miJacobs Creek Recreation Area11 mi
BeartreeMount Rogers National Recreation Area · 11 miLittle Oak CampgroundCherokee National Forest · 14 mi
Little Oak CampgroundCherokee National Forest · 15 miHighway TN 133 north from Highway 91. The campsite is on Highway 133, just north of Backbone Rock.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Damascus, VA
Typical weather
Typical October night 41°F, day 68°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 23°F, below freezing. Bring a bag rated colder than that, and expect ice in the water bottle.
Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or more
A normal is the 1991-2020 average for the month, not a forecast: about half of all Julys are colder than the July line. The seven-day forecast above answers the other question.
The land, and who answers for it
what threatens it · who answers for it
Roadless country, and what’s coming for it
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Backbone Rock Campground is in Tennessee’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Diana Harshbarger (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →