Big Reservoir Campground
3Heads up3 fires, nearest 11 mi
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $24From, per site
- Sites
- 1918 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 1 notices
In the agency’s own words
Big Reservoir Campground is adjacent to a privately operated lake and associated Morning Star Campground consisting of an additional 100 campsites. Use of the lake and associated facilities at Morning Star are subject to a $25.00 fee not associated with your reserved campsites at Big Reservoir Campground. Please contact the campground office at (530) 346-3028. Keep reading
Facilities
Big Reservoir offers vault toilets and drinking water. Each Campsite has one table and a fire ring with cooking grille. Camp supplies like firewood are available at the adjacent Morning Star Campground Office. Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (530) 346-3028.
Nearby Attractions
Morning Star Campground and Big Reservoir are adjacent to this campground. Sugar pine OHV Staging area nearby provides access to miles of Off Highway Vehicle trails. Sugar pine Reservoir offers fishing, boating, and swimming and is located 9 miles away.
What the agency tells you
Big Reservoir Campground is adjacent to a privately operated lake and associated Morning Star Campground consisting of an additional 100 campsites. Use of the lake and associated facilities at Morning Star are subject to fees not associated with your reserved campsites at Big Reservoir Campground. Please contact the campground office at (530) 346-3028 for more details.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 19 · 9 tent-only
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…Facilities Big Reservoir offers vault toilets and drinking water. Each Campsite has one table and…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…Big Reservoir offers vault toilets and drinking water. Each Campsite has one table and a fire ring with…”
- Firewood
- Mentioned
Around the campground
- On the water
- Reservoir, Lake
- Biking
- Canoeing
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Kayaking
- Off Road Vehicle Trails
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 18 of the 19 campsites the agency files here. The rest aren’t on its booking system, so a reservation won’t get you one.
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 · 17
What you actually pay
“Extra vehicle parking is extremely limited and is $5.00 per night in the campsite.” · the U.S. Forest Service’s own fee record
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $24 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 · 6
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
19 sites
All 19 sites
The price is derived by CAMPANAC, not published per site: the per-night rate this campground publishes for each site’s own site type. 18 of the 19 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| Big Reservoir Campground | 1 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 10 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 11 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 12 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 13 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 14 | tent only nonelectric | 50 amp | $24 |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 15 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 16 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 17 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 18 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 19 | tent only nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 2 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 3 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 4 | type not stated | ||
| Big Reservoir Campground | 5 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 6 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 7 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 8 | standard nonelectric | $24 | |
| Big Reservoir Campground | 9 | standard nonelectric | $24 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Forbes CreekTahoe National Forest · 1.7 mi
Shirttail CreekTahoe National Forest · 1.7 miForbes Group CampgroundTahoe National Forest · 1.8 mi
Giant GapTahoe National Forest · 2.0 mi
Tunnel Mills IITahoe National Forest · 9.3 miOnion Valley CampgroundTahoe National Forest · 9.8 miFollow Foresthill Rd to Sugar Pine Rd
37 min (28.6 mi)
Turn Left onto Sugar Pine Rd. Take Forest Rte 24 to Rd Big Reservoir Campground
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Alta, CA
Typical weather
Typical October night 41°F, day 66°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical December night 31°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
Big Reservoir Campground is in California’s 3rd congressional district. Its representative, Kevin Kiley (I), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →