Handsome Lake Boat Access Campground
- Right now
- OpenListed open; its database flags it not open
- Sites
- 41 on recreation.gov
- Season
- May 1 – October 31Open May 1 through October 31
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 1 notices
In the agency’s own words
Handsome Lake is a first-come, first-served campground only. Visitors are required to physically arrive at the campground to purchase and claim a site. Once on-site, you use a fee envelope and pay tube or 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
Facilities
Vault toilets are available There is no potable water **Campers need to bring thier own water. It is recommended that campers pack in thier own water. There are no boat docks at this campground.
What the agency tells you
- Handsome Lake has 20 campsites. - There is a 5.2 mile hike in utilizing the Tracy Ridge Trail system. Take Johnnycake section, then south on North Country Trail. - There is no potable water **Campers will need to bring thier own water. - Closest boat launch is Roper Hollow
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 4
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…or no cellular service. Facilities Vault toilets are available There is no potable water **Campers…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…Facilities Vault toilets are available There is no potable water **Campers need to bring thier own water. It is…”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake
- Fall color · reported 8 days ago, in Warren County
- Near peak
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 1 of the 4 campsites the agency files here. The rest aren’t on its booking system, so a reservation won’t get you one.
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
4 sites · the site map
All 4 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.
| Scan and Pay | ScanPay 2 | type not stated | |
| Scan and Pay | ScanPay 3 | type not stated | |
| Scan and Pay | ScanPay 4 | type not stated | |
| Scan and Pay | Standard | standard nonelectric | 214 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 phone number
Where it is
Hopewell Boat Access CampgroundAllegheny National Recreation Area · 0.7 mi
Hooks Brook Boat Access CampgroundAllegheny National Recreation Area · 2.8 mi
Tracy RidgeAllegheny National Recreation Area · 3.2 mi
Pine Grove Boat Access CampgroundAllegheny National Forest · 3.4 mi
Willow BayAllegheny National Recreation Area · 4.6 mi
DewdropAllegheny National Forest · 6.4 miThe weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Russell, PA
Typical weather
Typical October night 37°F, day 59°F.
Coldest night of the open season: typical October night 37°F. Bring the bag rated for it.
Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or moreOutside the published season
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
Handsome Lake Boat Access Campground is in Pennsylvania’s 15th congressional district. Its representative, Glenn Thompson (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →