Gray Pine Group Campground
4Heads up4 fires, nearest 30 mi
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 16:08 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 2 notices
In the agency’s own words
Perched 1,700 feet above sea level in the expanse of the Mendocino National Forest, the Gray Pine Group Camp is a beautiful recreation oasis for large groups and parties. Keep reading
Recreation
Mendocino National Forest's 913,306 acres of mountains and canyons offer a variety of recreational opportunities, including horseback riding, hiking, backpacking, boating, fishing and hunting, nature study and off-highway vehicle riding. Whether it's deer, birds, rabbits, chipmunks or perhaps the occasional bear, wildlife viewing is always a popular activity for visitors. The area is also an extremely popular destination during hunting season.
Facilities
Gray Pine Group Camp offers traditional camping and can hold up to 75 guests.
Natural Features
The Mendocino National Forest, California's only national forest that is not crossed by a paved road, straddles the eastern spur of the Coastal Mountain Range in northwestern California, just a three-hour drive north of San Francisco and Sacramento. Sprinkled throughout the dense green forest are several lakes, offering visitors additional recreational opportunities against a stunning backdrop.
Nearby Attractions
Popular OHV riding trails are easily accessible from the campground. Visit www.fs.usda.gov/mendocino for more information.
What the agency tells you
The combination for the locked entrance gate will be provided with your confirmation number
Don't Move Firewood: Protect California's forests from tree-killing pests by buying your firewood locally and burning it on-site. For more information visit firewood.ca.gov.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 group
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 70 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Dump station
- Yes
- recreation.gov lists “Dump Station”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Mountain biking
- OHV riding
- Off Road Vehicle Trails
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 389th darkest of 1,201 in CA
- Bortle 3
Full this Saturdayread 16:08 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBooked
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday. 1 is free on Tue, Oct 20. read 16:08 UTC Why the weekend fills and the week doesn’t
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.
We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.
Every line of the receipt · 12
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 · 5
recreation.gov availability, read 16:08 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
1 sites · the site map
All 1 sites
Toilet distances are OpenStreetMap’s, measured for 1 of the 1 sites listed. A site with no reading is unknown, never far.
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.
| GRAY PINE GROUP CAMPGROUND | G1 | group standard nonelectric | 70 ft | 136 ft | 357 ft | $75 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Mill Creek - Mendocino National ForestMendocino National Forest · 0.1 miMill Creek CampgroundMendocino National Forest · 0.1 mi
FoutsMendocino National Forest · 0.2 mi
South Fork Campground - Mendocino National ForestMendocino National Forest · 0.3 mi
Davis FlatMendocino National Forest · 0.4 mi
North Fork - Mendocino National ForestMendocino National Forest · 1.5 miFrom the South: From Interstate 5 take Exit 586 for Maxwell Road. Travel west for approximately nine miles to the town of Sites. At the junction turn right turn onto Sites-Ladoga Road and travel for about 15 miles to the town of Lodoga. Turn right at the junction, cross the bridge onto Ladoga-Stonyford Road and travel for approximately eight miles to the town of Stonyford. Turn left at the stop sign, drive two blocks north to Fouts Springs Road and turn left. Travel on Fouts Springs Road/Forest Road M10 for nine miles. Turn right onto Forest Road 18N03 towards Davis Flat and drive approximately 1/2 mile. Turn right at the locked gate; this is the entrance to Gray Pine.
From the North: From Interstate 5 take 162 West from Willows and travel 23 miles. At the junction turn left onto County Road 306/Stonyford-Elk Creek Road and travel about 18 miles to the town of Stonyford. Turn right onto Fouts Springs Road/Forest Road M10. After about nine miles turn right onto Forest Road 18N03 towards Davis Flat and drive approximately 1/2 mile. Turn right at the locked gate; this is the entrance to Gray Pine.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Stonyford, CA
Typical weather
Typical October night 45°F, day 79°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.
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 · a letter you can send
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Gray Pine Group Campground is in California’s 1st congressional district. Whoever holds it votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. See how its representative votes on public lands →
Our roster still carries Doug LaMalfa for this district and the current federal record doesn’t list them as sitting, so we’re not naming a representative here until the two agree.
Who can change it · 2
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.
- Your senator, on the same appropriationAdam B. SchiffU.S. Senator · California
- Your senator, on the same appropriationAlex PadillaU.S. Senator · California
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.
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 Gray Pine Group Campground, Mendocino National Forest, California
Dear Adam B. Schiff, I’m a constituent in California. I tried to camp at Gray Pine Group Campground, Mendocino National Forest, California, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Gray Pine Group Campground 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 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Gray Pine Group Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Gray Pine Group Campground. 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 Gray Pine Group Campground (Mendocino National Forest, California) via campanac.com
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 Gray Pine Group Campground, Mendocino National Forest, California
Dear Alex Padilla, I’m a constituent in California. I tried to camp at Gray Pine Group Campground, Mendocino National Forest, California, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Gray Pine Group Campground 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 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Gray Pine Group Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Gray Pine Group Campground. 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 Gray Pine Group Campground (Mendocino National Forest, California) via campanac.com