Hard Rock Campground
1Heads up1 fire 33 mi away
- Right now
- Closed for the seasonOut of the season the agency publishes
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
- Season
- May 1 – September 30Open May 1 through September 30
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 10 notices
In the agency’s own words
Hard Rock Campground is a small, primitive group site along the South Fork of the McKenzie River in Oregon. Many hiking trails are available in the surrounding area and the river offers fishing opportunities. Keep reading
Recreation
The river offers good catch-and-release fishing for wild redside and cutthroat trout. Cougar Reservoir is open to motorized boating and offers a beautiful setting.
Facilities
The campground offers one tent-only group campsite that can accommodate up to 10 people. No water or electricity is available at Hard Rock. Campfire rings, picnic tables, portable toilets and trash collection are provided.
Natural Features
The campground sits just south of Cougar Reservoir, near where Balm Creek feeds into the South Fork, at an elevation of 1,800 feet. Hard Rock is set on the western slopes of the Cascade Mountains, where gorgeous, lush mountain landscapes abound.
Nearby Attractions
Just east of Cougar Reservoir, the Castle Rock Trail leads through a dense Douglas-fir forest to the top of Castle Rock. Once on top, hikers enjoy impressive views of the McKenzie River Valley below.
What the agency tells you
Bring your own water; no water available at this facility
No hookups available
This facility is reservation only
Everything else this campground posts · 7
Don't Move Firewood: Please protect Pacific Northwest forests by preventing the spread of invasive species. Firewood can carry insects and diseases that can threaten the health of our western forests. You can make a difference by obtaining and burning your firewood near your camping destination. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.
Be bear aware; keep all food out of sight in approved containers or locked inside your vehicle and remove all food from the area after eating
No discharging firearms, possession of fireworks or use of chainsaws allowed
Be sure to reserve a site that will accommodate your equipment. The site you reserve is your site. You may not move to another site.
Any accepted senior passes must be entered for the discount at the time of booking for single sites only.
Click here for more information on the Willamette National Forest
Customer Service Contact 801-226-3564 or Help.Willamette.McKenzieRiver@AmericanLL.com
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 group
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 36 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Portable Toilets
- “…Rock. Campfire rings, picnic tables, portable toilets and trash collection are provided. Natural Features…”
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Reservoir, River, Creek
- Fishing
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 357th darkest of 770 in OR
- Bortle 2
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
Every site here is reservable, and the record lists none held back for anyone who drives up.
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.
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 · 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
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
1 sites · the site map
All 1 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. 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 HARD ROCK CAMPGROUND | 001 | group standard area nonelectric | 36 ft | 272 ft | $35 |
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
French Pete CampgroundWillamette National Forest · 0.4 mi
Cougar Crossing CampgroundWillamette National Forest · 1.6 mi
Sunnyside CampgroundWillamette National Forest · 1.7 mi
Slide CreekWillamette National Forest · 2.7 mi
Red Diamond CampgroundWillamette National Forest · 2.9 mi
Indian Ridge LookoutWillamette National Forest · 3.5 miFrom Blue River, OR, travel 4 miles east on Highway 126 to Aufderheide Drive (Forest Service Road 19). Turn right on Aufderheide Drive and continue south about 3/4 mile. Veer right at the Y and continue 10 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 Oakridge, OR
Typical weather
Typical May night 50°F, day 74°F.
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 Augusts are colder than the August 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
Hard Rock Campground is in Oregon’s 4th congressional district. Its representative, Val Hoyle (D), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: A. See every public-lands vote →