Blue Bend Rec Area
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $20–$50Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 21All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 4 notices
In the agency’s own words
Blue Bend Recreation Area is a quaint wooded area filled with plenty of hiking, picnicking and camping opportunities. Constructed in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps, the rustic wood tables and shelters appeal to many day and overnight visitors. The recreation area, along Anthony Creek, has a selection of single family campsites and 2 picnic shelters. The large group picnic shelter accommodates 75 people and can be reserved in peak season. Keep reading
Recreation
Swimming is nice and refreshing in Anthony Creek, and anglers can find trout here. The Blue Bend Recreation Area provides access to the BIg Draft WIlderness. A popular excursion into the wilderness is the 5-mile Blue Bend Loop Trail, which connects to the Anthony Creek Trail. Blue Bend Loop Trail offers 3 scenic overlooks.
Facilities
Flush toilets and showers are available in summer, and vault toilets can be used through the spring and fall seasons. Running water is also seasonal, but a hand pump is available through spring and fall. Each site is on a parking spur with a picnic table, campfire ring, trash bin and lantern post.
Natural Features
At an elevation of 1,860 feet, the campground is in a pleasant, wooded valley facing Round Mountain in the Monongahela National Forest. The forest comprises about a million acres of forest that attracts 1.3 million visitors each year. A variety of animals make their home here, including black bear, coyote, wild turkey, white-tailed deer, red and gray fox, bobcat, fisher, otter and mink. Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (681) 368-0663.
Nearby Attractions
Nearby attractions include the Greenbrier River Trail, and the town of White Sulphur Springs.
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 Monongahela National Forest, click here
Don't move firewood: To limit the spread of invasive tree-killing pests, firewood from outside the area is not permitted. Some states have quarantines and may confiscate your firewood. Please help protect our forests from invasive species by obtaining your firewood at or near your camping destination and burning it on-site. Visit dontmovefirewood.org for more information.
Everything else this campground posts · 1
Access Road Subject to FLOODING – Roads accessing this recreation area may become impassable due to flash flooding. Monitor conditions and expect delays in departing until flood waters recede. YOUR SAFTETY IS YOUR RESPONSIBILTY
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 21
- Hookups
- 3 electric
- Longest rig
- 60 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets · Vault Toilets
- “…offers 3 scenic overlooks. Facilities Flush toilets and showers are available in summer, and vault…”
- Showers
- Yes, the record doesn’t say what kind
- “Facilities Flush toilets and showers are available in summer, and vault toilets can be used through the spring and fall seasons.”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…Running water is also seasonal, but a hand pump is available through spring and fall. Each site is…”
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- River, Creek
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Swimming
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 36th darkest of 69 in WV
- Bortle 3
- Fall color · reported 9 days ago, 25 km away
- Peak color
Nothing on the booking system for the next 30 nightsread 15:59 UTC
Every site here is reservable, and the record lists none held back for anyone who drives up.
Every one of the next thirty nights is in recreation.gov’s record and not one site is being offered on any of them. That’s a campground closed or not yet released for booking, not a sold-out one.
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 · 19
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $20–$50 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
recreation.gov availability, read 15:59 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
23 records · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 23 mapped sitesAll 23 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. 21 of the 23 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| BLUE | 001 | day use | 258 ft | 320 ft | |||
| BLUE BEND | 001 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | 229 ft | 276 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 002 | standard electric | 60 ft | 107 ft | 166 ft | $30–$50 | |
| BLUE BEND | 003 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | 107 ft | 74 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 004 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 107 ft | 187 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 005 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 74 ft | 83 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 006 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 70 ft | 81 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 007 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 117 ft | 192 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 008 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 70 ft | 75 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 009 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | 122 ft | 191 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 010 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 88 ft | 24 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 011 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 88 ft | 75 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 012 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | 93 ft | 79 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 013 | rv electric | 60 ft | 50 amp | 91 ft | 210 ft | $50 |
| BLUE BEND | 014 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 93 ft | 83 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 015 | standard electric | 55 ft | 30 amp | 91 ft | 220 ft | $30–$50 |
| BLUE BEND | 016 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 95 ft | 121 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 017 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 95 ft | 143 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 018 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 109 ft | 267 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 019 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 54 ft | 17 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 020 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 54 ft | under 10 ft | $20 | |
| BLUE BEND | 021 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | 127 ft | 26 ft | $20 | |
| BLUS | 002 | day use | 544 ft | 87 ft | $50 |
The agency files 2 more records here that aren’t sites for the night. It files them as day use. They’re in the table above, marked for what they are, and none of them is 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
Blue Meadow1.2 mi
Hopkins Mountain Fireman's CabinMonongahela National Forest · 2.1 mi
Lake Sherwood Recreation Area and CampgroundMonongahela National Forest · 15 mi
Lake SherwoodMonongahela National Forest · 15 mi
Morris Hill CampgroundGeorge Washington National Forest · 16 miFrom White Sulphur Springs, travel 8 miles north on State Route 92. Turn left (west) at Alvon, West Virginia, onto State Route 16. Travel 4 miles to the recreation area.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Falling Spring, WV
Typical weather
Typical October night 39°F, day 65°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 20°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
Blue Bend Rec Area is in West Virginia’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Carol Miller (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →