U.S. Forest Service · Boise National Forest · ID
Bald Mountain Campground
1Heads up1 fire 39 mi away
Wildfire
East Fork fire · 39 mi away · 1 acres · updated Oct 17, 2026
Fires: NIFC/IRWIN via MTJP wildfire tracker · Oct 17, 2026
First come, first servedNo reservation, and none to be had: the sites go to whoever pulls in first.
This is how it should work.
- Right now
- Closed for the seasonOut of the season the agency publishes
- Season
- July 1 – September 30Open July 1 through September 30
6,800 ftElevation
2,232 ftWater · Middle Fork Thorn Creek
12.3 miNE of Robie Creek, ID
22%Tree cover
Bortle 3Night sky · 500th darkest of 523 in ID
Open July 1 through September 30Today
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there
In the agency’s own words
The Bald Mountain Campground is near Idaho City, Idaho. The campground has 4 campsites in a secluded, forested area. A trail from campground goes east to the Middle Fork of the Boise River. A second trail goes from the Thorn Creek Butte Lookout south of the campground and follows Cottonwood Creek south.
Source: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
Around the campground
- On the water
- River, Creek
Source: Stated in the agency description
Nothing to book, just show up
One of 1,623 federal campgrounds where the site still goes to whoever pulls in first. Get there before noon on a summer weekend.
recreation.gov publishes no availability for a campground you can’t reserve, so there’s no thirty-night reading to draw here. The season bar above is what the agency does publish.
BookingNo reservationsNothing to book, and no release date to wait forthe record
Runs itU.S. Forest Servicethe agency’s record
Every line of the receipt · 3
What you actually pay
The sign priceU.S. Forest Service
The U.S. Forest Service publishes no per-night rate for this campground that we can read, so there’s no sign price to print. That’s a gap in the record, not a free campground.
The booking feerecreation.gov
Nothing. This campground takes no bookings, so there’s no reservation fee to pay.
What a stay costs
The agency publishes no nightly rate for this campground, so there’s no total to show.
How we know this receipt · 4
Booking fee, change fee, cancellation fee, no-show: Rules and Reservation Policies, Recreation.gov, the published fee schedule, curated by hand into lib/reservation-fee-schedule.json (9 rows, each carrying its own verbatim sentence). The publisher states these policies were last updated September 2019. · Sep 9, 2026
The two totals: Derived by CAMPANAC by adding the agency’s own published nightly rate to recreation.gov’s own published reservation fee. Both components are cited above; the addition is ours and is shown only where every component is known. · Sep 9, 2026
Who keeps the booking fee: Recreation.gov facility policy text, Dead Swede Campground (facility 234221) · Not on the national policy page. This is agency policy text recreation.gov publishes on individual campground pages; this site holds it verbatim on 45 active campgrounds (campground_rules.cancellation_description, scripts/load-facility-rules.mjs). · Sep 9, 2026
The contract: Reservation Gods: Who Stole Our Campsites and Sold Them Back to Us, More Than Just Parks, April 2025 · Apr 1, 2025
Source: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
record Aug 24, 2026 · How we know all this
Getting there
the map and the coordinate
Where it is
Also near hereTroutdale CampgroundBoise National Forest · 6.1 miBadger Creek CampgroundBoise National Forest · 6.1 miWillow Creek Campground (Mountain Home)Boise National Forest · 7.3 miGrayback Campground and Group sites - reserveBoise National Forest · 7.3 mi
GraybackBoise National Forest · 7.5 mi
Black RockBoise National Forest · 8.2 mi
GraybackBoise National Forest · 7.5 miBlack RockBoise National Forest · 8.2 miSource: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
The weather
the next four days
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
Today63°Sunny
Tonight44°Partly Cloudy
Sunday60°Sunny
Sunday Night44°Mostly Clear
NWS forecast for Idaho City, ID
Source: National Weather Service, BOI forecast office · Oct 17, 2026
The land, and who answers for it
what threatens it · who answers for it
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Source: MTJP Threatened Lands map · Oct 5, 2026
Who answers for this land
Bald Mountain Campground is in Idaho’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Russ Fulcher (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →
How we know
every fact on this page, and where it came from
Right now: The agency lists it out of season. The season it publishes is the bar below.
Season: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
Elevation: USGS 3DEP elevation point query at this campground’s coordinate · Sep 7, 2026
Tree cover: NLCD Tree Canopy Cover 2024 (USDA Forest Service / MRLC), one 30 m cell at this coordinate · Sep 9, 2026
Cell signal: the Forest Service’s own campground description, read as text by CAMPANAC. None of this is a measurement. It’s what the land manager published about the place, and phones, carriers and weather all disagree with each other; treat it as a warning, not a promise.
Nearest place of any size: Idaho City, ID, 6.5 mi SE. Straight line.