U.S. Forest Service · Tongass National Forest · AK

Fish Creek Cabin

Reservable, and full this SaturdayThe one site on offer is taken this Saturday, and the record lists no site held back for a walk-up. read 16:03 UTC

We don’t think it should be. Every campground should hold some sites for whoever drives up.Tell your representative →

Right now
Taking bookingsSites offered on 30 of the next 30 nights read 16:03 UTC
Sites
1All of them booked ahead
50 ftElevation
223 ftWater · Fish CreekOcean · 37 ft · to the Pacific Ocean
16.7 miE of Ketchikan, AK
65%Tree cover
Bortle 2Night sky · 172nd darkest of 280 in AK

The place

the agency’s own description · what’s there · 10 notices

In the agency’s own words

Fish Creek Cabin is located on Revillagigedo Island, at the confluence of freshwater Fish Creek and saltwater Thorne Arm. The rustic, secluded retreat is available year-round for relaxation, sightseeing and recreation. The site can be accessed by float plane, boat or kayak, depending on conditions. Guests are responsible for their own travel arrangements and safety, and must bring several of their own amenities. Keep reading

Recreation

Crabbing is possible for Dungeness crab, and saltwater fishing is available for salmon, halibut and rockfish. Fish Creek offers opportunities for freshwater fishing for cutthroat and rainbow trout, steelhead and Dolly Varden. Hikers can access two trails from the cabin. The Low Lake Trail leads to Big Lake in Misty Fjords National Monument wilderness, following along Low Lake and Fish Creek on the way. Gokachin Lake Trail starts across the outlet of Fish Creek and leads to Star Lake. Sea kayaking is an extremely popular way of getting around, but guests must provide their own equipment and consult local tide tables before setting out.

Facilities

This 12-by-14 cabin ( pan-abode style ) has two single and two double bunks, to accommodate up to six people. It is also equipped with a table and benches, broom, a small wood stove and an outhouse. A mooring float is available, but it is not for the exclusive use of cabin guests. Water, wood, and electricity are not provided. Guests must bring wood or biobricks for the wood stove. Biobricks can be purchased in Ketchikan and on Prince of Wales. The stove is not designed for use with wax logs such as duraflame. Water is available from the creek, but guests should be sure to treat water before drinking or cooking with it ( water safety tips ). It is recommended that guests bring their own water supply. Other items to pack include sleeping bags, sleeping pads, lanterns or flashlights, cookware, plates, utensils, food, toilet paper, garbage bags, a fire extinguisher and matches, among other necessities. Guests are expected to pack out trash and clean the cabin before leaving ( click here for more cabin details).

Natural Features

The cabin is tucked into a densely wooded area overlooking Thorne Arm. Fish Creek bubbles into Thorne Arm on the left side of the cabin. A gravel beach is revealed at the front of the cabin during low tides. Sitka black-tailed deer, black bear, beaver, marten, and mink are common to the area ( bear safety information ). Seals and orcas have been seen in Thorne Arm.

What the agency tells you

Rule

The stove is designed to use wood or compressed sawdust logs. Use of waxlogs is not safe due as it can lead to increased risk of chimney fire.

Rule

This facility is located in an extremely remote and wild area; before making a reservation, become aware of bear, water, and weather safety (including cold)

Rule

Recreating in Alaska can present both obvious and hidden dangers; please be aware of your surroundings and be prepared for extended stays due to occasionally poor weather

Everything else this campground posts · 7
Rule

Water is not available at the cabin; guests must bring their own water supply

Rule

Please pack out all trash and food

Rule

Use of this cabin by a commercial operator, such as an outfitter or guide, is not allowed

Rule

High levels of Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP) have been reported in this area

Rule

Click here for more information about Tongass National Forest

Rule

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.

Rule

The invasive European Green Crab (EGC) has been found in southern Southeast Alaska and is suspected to be in more locations on the Tongass National Forest. Please actively look for and report EGC to help map the distribution and contribute to management.

Read them on the agency’s own page →

Tents and rigs

Sites
1 · 1 cabin
Hookups
None
Accessible sites
None listed
Source: Recreation.gov campsite records · Aug 23, 2026

Facilities

Toilets
Yes, the record doesn't say what kind
“It is also equipped with a table and benches, broom, a small wood stove and an outhouse.”
Drinking water
None, bring your own
“…tips ). It is recommended that guests bring their own water supply. Other items to pack include sleeping bags,…”

Around the campground

On the water
Lake, Creek, Beach
Boating
Fishing
Hiking
Wildlife viewing
Source: Recreation.gov activity records · Aug 23, 2026

Full this Saturdayread 16:03 UTC

How full the weekend is nationally.

2 campgrounds have sites open within 30 miles, read 15:55 UTC. See them

OpenBooked

The one site on offer is taken this Saturday. 1 is free on Mon, Oct 19. read 16:03 UTC Why the weekend fills and the week doesn’t

Booking window6 months outBookable now through April 16, 2027. Today at 10 AM ET, availability opens through April 17, 2027.recreation.gov
Max stay7 nightsthe facility record
Sites, a night, from$65From the rate schedule matched to 1 of its 1 sites. U.S. Forest Service publishes no campground-level rate we can read.derived by CAMPANAC
If plans change$10 to cancel$10 to change a reservationrecreation.gov’s schedule
Runs itU.S. Forest ServiceBooked through recreation.govthe agency’s record
Watch for a cancellation

Watch this campground

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.

Free forever, no booking kickbacks.
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’ll write once, when the season that starts Sat, May 1 2027 is open for booking.

Free forever, no booking kickbacks.
Where there’s room this weekendBook on recreation.gov ↗

We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.

Every line of the receipt · 15

What you actually pay

The sign priceU.S. Forest Service
Sites, a night, from$65
Derived by CAMPANAC from the rate schedule matched to 1 of its 1 sites. U.S. Forest Service publishes no campground-level rate for this campground that we can read, only per-site rate templates its own record matches to each site’s own type.
Group area, a night$65
Rates for the season the campground is in now, Oct 1, 2026 to Dec 31, 2026.
Only one change per reservation for all Alaska cabins is allowed.
Change is defined as a modification to the start or end date of the reservation
after one change has been made, if additional changes are desired, the customer must cancel the current reservation and re-book the new dates.
The booking feerecreation.gov
Reservation fee, booked online$8
One fee per reservation, however many nights you book, and it’s non-refundable. $9 if you book by phone, $3 in person.
Pass discounts only apply to the recreation (or use) fee for the facility. Other charges such as electricity or water hookups, reservation or other fees are not eligible for a discount.
What a stay costs
The agency publishes no nightly rate for this campground, so there’s nothing to add the $8 booking fee to. We won’t total a receipt with a number missing from it.
If your plans changerecreation.gov
Change fee, moving to dates outside your booking$10
Cancellation fee$10
Cancelling the day before, or the day of$10 + your first night
No-show$20 + your first night

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
Open within 30 miles this weekend · 2

Sites the agency is offering this Friday and Saturday that nobody has taken, nearest first. read 15:55 UTC

recreation.gov availability, read 16:03 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this

Seen something wrong here? Tell us.

The sites

1 sites · the site map

All 1 sites

1 of 1 sites located
Cabin or shelter1
Aerial · Esri World Imagery
SleepsUp to

The price is derived by CAMPANAC, not published per site: the per-night rate this campground publishes for each site’s own site type. 1 of the 1 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.

AREA FISH CREEK CABINK03cabin nonelectric394 ft$65

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
Coordinate55.39140, -131.19770
The phone907-225-2148
The agency’s pageOfficial page ↗

Where it is

Getting there

The cabin is located approximately 20 air miles from Ketchikan, at the North end of Thorne Arm. Accessible by float plane or boat. A saltwater mooring buoy is available on a first-come, first-served basis. Refer to USGS topographic map for Ketchikan B-4, and check local tide tables if navigating a boat or kayak in saltwater.

The weather

the next four days · the thirty-year normal

Next four days, and the thirty-year normal

Forecast

Tonight43°Rain Showers Likely62% rain
Saturday50°Rain Showers100% rain
Saturday Night43°Rain Showers89% rain
Sunday47°Rain Showers100% rain

NWS forecast for Saxman, AK

Typical weather

Typical October night 43°F, day 52°F.

Coldest month of the year: typical January night 32°F, below freezing. Bring a bag rated colder than that, and expect ice in the water bottle.

80°32°20°

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 Augusts are colder than the August line. The seven-day forecast above answers the other question.

Measured at: BEAVER FALLS, AK (USC00500657), 20 miles away and at about the same elevation

The land, and who answers for it

what threatens it · who answers for it · a letter you can send

What threatens this place

Roadless
South Revilla52,105 acres · 7 mi · inventoried roadless area
Roadless
Carroll11,366 acres · 9 mi · inventoried roadless area

You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.

Source: MTJP Threatened Lands map · Oct 16, 2026

Who answers for this land

Nick Begich, official portrait

Fish Creek Cabin 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 →

Seen something wrong here? Tell us.

Who can change it · 3
Write to somebody who can change it

Two offices, two different asks. The draft to the agency asks it to set aside a published share of the sites here for whoever drives up. The draft to Congress asks why that share is zero and presses for a published minimum at the campgrounds it funds.

Read the draft, or change the wording

For the camper who turned up, or tried to book, and couldn’t get in. Every draft is written from this campground’s own record (its agency, its unit, its site count and its own weekend) and the buttons above copy whichever wording is selected here.

To Nicholas J. Begich III

Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.

Subject Walk-up camping at Fish Creek Cabin, Tongass National Forest, Alaska

Dear Nicholas J. Begich III,

I’m a constituent in Alaska, at-large. I tried to camp at Fish Creek Cabin, Tongass National Forest, Alaska, and couldn’t.

All 1 sites at Fish Creek Cabin are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked.

1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Fish Creek Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule.

I’m not asking you to run Fish Creek Cabin. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund.

The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them.

Sent about Fish Creek Cabin (Tongass National Forest, Alaska) via campanac.com
To Dan Sullivan

Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.

Subject Walk-up camping at Fish Creek Cabin, Tongass National Forest, Alaska

Dear Dan Sullivan,

I’m a constituent in Alaska. I tried to camp at Fish Creek Cabin, Tongass National Forest, Alaska, and couldn’t.

All 1 sites at Fish Creek Cabin are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked.

1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Fish Creek Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule.

I’m not asking you to run Fish Creek Cabin. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund.

The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them.

Sent about Fish Creek Cabin (Tongass National Forest, Alaska) via campanac.com
To Lisa Murkowski

Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.

Subject Walk-up camping at Fish Creek Cabin, Tongass National Forest, Alaska

Dear Lisa Murkowski,

I’m a constituent in Alaska. I tried to camp at Fish Creek Cabin, Tongass National Forest, Alaska, and couldn’t.

All 1 sites at Fish Creek Cabin are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked.

1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Fish Creek Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule.

I’m not asking you to run Fish Creek Cabin. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund.

The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them.

Sent about Fish Creek Cabin (Tongass National Forest, Alaska) via campanac.com
How we know this · 4
The figures in these drafts: Navy Ford (CVN-78) Class Aircraft Carrier Program: Background and Issues for Congress (CRS Report RS20643) · Updated December 4, 2025 · “The ship’s final procurement cost was $13,316.5 million (i.e., about $13.3 billion) in then-year dollars.”
The figures in these drafts: Salary Table 2026-GS, Incorporating the 1% General Schedule Increase, Effective January 2026 (U.S. Office of Personnel Management) · Effective January 2026 · “Grade 5, Step 1: $34,799 (annual rate, before locality pay).”
The figures in these drafts: Update to Civilian Position Full Fringe Benefit Cost Factor, Federal Pay Raise Assumptions, and Inflation Factors used in OMB Circular No. A-76 (OMB Memorandum M-08-13) · March 11, 2008 · “the civilian position full fringe benefit cost factor needs to be adjusted downward, from 36.45 percent to 36.25 percent”

How we know

every fact on this page, and where it came from
Right now: recreation.gov is offering sites on 30 of the next 30 nights, which isn’t something a closed campground does.
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: Saxman, AK, 15.5 mi ENE. Straight line.