French Creek
- Right now
- Closedrecreation.gov lists every site closed this weekend, read 15:51 UTC
- A night
- $20When it reopens, per site
- Sites
- 21In the agency’s record
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 5 notices
In the agency’s own words
French Creek Campground is located next to scenic Lake Cascade in west-central Idaho. It is near the town of Donnelly, at an elevation of 4,850 feet. Boating, fishing, swimming and hiking are popular activities in this scenic region. Keep reading
Recreation
Lake Cascade offers excellent opportunities for boating, water skiing, canoeing, windsurfing and sailing. Anglers enjoy casting for rainbow trout, coho salmon, smallmouth bass and perch. Many hiking and biking trails are in the area as well.
Facilities
The campground is divided into two sections of campsites. Some are located on the east side of West Mountain Road, closer to the lakeshore and with beautiful lake views. Other sites are on the west side of the road, on a hillside above the lake. A few of these sites have partial lake views. Some also have stairs from the parking spur to the campsite. Campsites are equipped with a table and campfire ring. Vault toilets, drinking water and trash collection are provided, but there is no electricity at the campground. Roads and parking spurs within the facility are gravel.
Natural Features
The campground is situated on the western shore of Lake Cascade and on the banks of French Creek. A forest of mixed conifers covers the campground, providing ample shade. Thimbleberry and huckleberry plants are abundant throughout the upper reaches of the campground. A wide variety of wildlife makes its home around the lake. Waterfowl and songbirds are abundant, as well as pelicans and bald eagles.
What the agency tells you
Idaho OHV Safety Message
Bears frequent the area; please keep a clean camp and be bear aware
Some first-come, first-served sites may also be available
Everything else this campground posts · 2
Click here for more information on the Boise National Forest
Don't Move Firewood: Help prevent the spread of tree-killing pests in our national forests by obtaining firewood near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 21
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 45 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…equipped with a table and campfire ring. Vault toilets, drinking water and trash collection are provided,…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…table and campfire ring. Vault toilets, drinking water and trash collection are provided, but there is no…”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, Creek
- Boating
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Water sports
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 352nd darkest of 523 in ID
- Bortle 2
Nothing to book until it reopensread 15:51 UTC
recreation.gov lists every site closed this weekend
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.
Tell me when it reopens
Watch for it to come back
One email when the agency reopens it, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We check the agency’s own record once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time it stops saying closed.
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.
Every line of the receipt · 10
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
Why this page can’t say why
recreation.gov lists every site at French Creek closed this Friday and Saturday night. The U.S. Forest Service has published no closure notice we hold, so this page can’t say why, and it won’t fill the gap with a guess. A closed night isn’t a sold-out one: the reservations its record still carries were taken before the sites were closed.
There’s no notice to quote and no reason to argue with, so this page offers you the watch and the list below, and no letter.
Open within 60 miles · 1
The agency’s own word that these are open, not our reading of a season.
- Ninemeyer CampgroundBoise National Forest · 60 mi · walk-up
recreation.gov availability, read 15:51 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
21 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 21 mapped sitesAll 21 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. 21 of the 21 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
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.
| FREN | 001 | standard nonelectric | 69 ft | 45 ft | $20 | |
| FREN | 002 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 74 ft | 118 ft | $20 |
| FREN | 003 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 69 ft | 37 ft | $20 |
| FREN | 004 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 74 ft | 158 ft | $20 |
| FREN | 005 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 78 ft | 44 ft | $20 |
| FREN | 006 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 107 ft | 145 ft | $20 |
| FREN | 007 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 78 ft | 37 ft | $20 |
| FREN | 008 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 91 ft | 45 ft | $20 |
| UP | 009 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 130 ft | 284 ft | $20 |
| UP | 010 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 130 ft | 376 ft | $20 |
| UP | 011 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 121 ft | 511 ft | $20 |
| UP | 012 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 121 ft | 583 ft | $20 |
| UP | 013 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 102 ft | 727 ft | $20 |
| UP | 014 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 102 ft | 752 ftLake Cascade | $20 |
| UP | 015 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 125 ft | 917 ftLake Cascade | $20 |
| UP | 016 | standard nonelectric | 125 ft | 797 ftLake Cascade | $20 | |
| UP | 017 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 178 ft | 782 ftLake Cascade | $20 |
| UP | 018 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 116 ft | 946 ftLake Cascade | $20 |
| UP | 019 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 116 ft | 831 ftLake Cascade | $20 |
| UP | 020 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 166 ft | 1,024 ftLake Cascade | $20 |
| UP | 021 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 166 ft | 1,185 ftLake Cascade | $20 |
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
Big FlatPayette National Forest · 7.7 mi
Cabin CreekPayette National Forest · 12 mi
AmanitaPayette National Forest · 12 mi
Rainbow PointPayette National Forest · 12 mi
Sagehen CreekBoise National Forest · 14 miShady Pines CampgroundBoise National Forest · 14 miFrom Boise, Idaho, travel north on Highway 55 for 85 miles to Cascade. Turn west on Old State Highway and go a half-mile to Lakeshore Drive. Turn south and travel 3 miles to West Mountain Road. Turn west and follow the road 5 miles to the campground.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Cascade, ID
Typical weather
Typical October night 31°F, day 58°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 15°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
French Creek 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 →