Black Bear Campground
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- Sites
- 12All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 3 notices
In the agency’s own words
This location is available on a first-come, first-served basis only. Visitors are required to physically arrive at the campground to purchase and claim a site. Once on-site, you may be able to pay for your campsite(s) by scanning a QR code using the Recreation.gov mobile app, and the Scan and Pay feature. If this option is available, you will need to first download the free Recreation.gov mobile app https://www.recreation.gov/mobile-app prior to your arrival as some remote areas have limited or no cellular service. Keep reading
Recreation
Wildlife viewing includes moose, brown and black bears, mountain goats, lynx, bald eagles, and salmon. The Trail of Blue Ice that stretches almost the entire length of Portage Valley can be reached from the campground. From this trail you can acces the Williwaw Nature Trail, Williwaw Fish Viewing Platform, Moose Flats Area, Begich Boggs Visitor Center, Byron Glacier Trail, and Portage Glacier Cruises. Portage Lake, at the head of the valley, allows access for kayaking and packrafting.
Facilities
Vault toilets, picnic tables, and bear boxes are provided at Black Bear Campground. Campsites are nicely separated, but no electric hookups are available.
Natural Features
Black Bear campground sits in the stunning Portage Valley in the Chugach National Forest. Contact Info This location is unstaffed. To speak with our main office for general information, please call: (907) 782-3242.
Nearby Attractions
Begich Boggs Visitor Center lies at the head of Portage Valley where you can learn about glaciers and Alaska. The Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center is located on near the intersect of the Seward Higway and Portage Highway. Here you can see all different kinds of Alaskan wildlife. Portage Glacier Cruises offers the chance to ride a boat and get up close to Portage Glacier.
What the agency tells you
Be bear aware; keep all food out of sight in approved containers or locked inside your vehicle and remove all food from area after eating.
For more information on Chugach National Forest, click here
Don't Move Firewood: Prevent the spread of tree-killing pests by purchasing firewood near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 12
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…for kayaking and packrafting. Facilities Vault toilets, picnic tables, and bear boxes are provided at…”
- Bear boxes
- Yes
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- 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.
We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.
Every line of the receipt · 9
What you actually pay
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 · 4
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · record Aug 23, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
12 sites · the site map
All 12 sites
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.
| Black Bear | 002 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 003 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 004 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 005 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 006 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 007 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 008 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 009 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 010 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 011 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | 012 | standard nonelectric | |
| Black Bear | Scan & Pay | standard nonelectric | 310 ft |
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
Williwaw CampgroundChugach National Forest · 0.4 mi
Spencer Bench CabinChugach National Forest · 6.7 mi
Spencer Glacier Whistle Stop Group CampgroundChugach National Forest · 8.1 miBertha Creek CampgroundChugach National Forest · 13 mi
Granite CreekChugach National Forest · 15 mi
Pigot Bay CabinChugach National Forest · 17 miAt mile post 78.9 of the Seward Highway, turn onto the Portage Highway. Drive 3.7 miles and the Black Bear Campground will be on your right.
The weather
the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Typical weather
Typical October night 31°F, day 43°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 16°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
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Black Bear Campground is in Alaska’s at-large congressional district. Its representative, Nick Begich (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →