U.S. Forest Service · Sequoia National Forest · CA
Horse Meadow Campground
2Heads up2 fires, nearest 14 mi
Wildfire
Cyrus fire · 14 mi away · 543 acres · 95% contained · updated Oct 16, 2026
Wildfire
Carrier fire · 48 mi away · updated Oct 17, 2026
Fires: NIFC/IRWIN via MTJP wildfire tracker · Oct 17, 2026
First come, first servedNo reservation, and none to be had: the sites go to whoever pulls in first.
This is how it should work.
- Right now
- OpenListed open; its database flags it not open
- Season
- May 1 – November 30Open May 1 through November 30
7,370 ftElevation
177 ftWater · Salmon Creek
12.7 miNE of Wofford Heights, CA
0%Tree cover
Bortle 3Night sky · 536th darkest of 1,201 in CA
Open May 1 through November 30Today
The place
the agency’s own description
In the agency’s own words
7600-foot elevation. 41 campsites. Horse Corrals. Near Cherry Hill Road 22S12/23S10. Maximum RV length 22 feet. Special food storage rule in effect because this is black bear country! Check current fire restrictions before venturing out.
Source: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026
Nothing to book, just show up
One of 1,623 federal campgrounds where the site still goes to whoever pulls in first. Get there before noon on a summer weekend.
recreation.gov publishes no availability for a campground you can’t reserve, so there’s no thirty-night reading to draw here. The season bar above is what the agency does publish.
Every line of the receipt · 3
What you actually pay
The sign priceU.S. Forest Service
The U.S. Forest Service publishes no per-night rate for this campground that we can read, so there’s no sign price to print. That’s a gap in the record, not a free campground.
The booking feerecreation.gov
Nothing. This campground takes no bookings, so there’s no reservation fee to pay.
What a stay costs
The agency publishes no nightly rate for this campground, so there’s no total to show.
How we know this receipt · 4
Booking fee, change fee, cancellation fee, no-show: Rules and Reservation Policies, Recreation.gov, the published fee schedule, curated by hand into lib/reservation-fee-schedule.json (9 rows, each carrying its own verbatim sentence). The publisher states these policies were last updated September 2019. · Sep 9, 2026
The two totals: Derived by CAMPANAC by adding the agency’s own published nightly rate to recreation.gov’s own published reservation fee. Both components are cited above; the addition is ours and is shown only where every component is known. · Sep 9, 2026
Who keeps the booking fee: Recreation.gov facility policy text, Dead Swede Campground (facility 234221) · Not on the national policy page. This is agency policy text recreation.gov publishes on individual campground pages; this site holds it verbatim on 45 active campgrounds (campground_rules.cancellation_description, scripts/load-facility-rules.mjs). · Sep 9, 2026
The contract: Reservation Gods: Who Stole Our Campsites and Sold Them Back to Us, More Than Just Parks, April 2025 · Apr 1, 2025
Source: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026
rules read Sep 7, 2026 · record Aug 23, 2026 · How we know all this
Getting there
the map and the coordinate
Coordinate35.90201, -118.37125
The mapSee it on the map
The driveDirections ↗
The agency’s pageOfficial page ↗
Where it is
Also near here
Goldledge CampgroundSequoia National Forest · 5.2 mi
Fairview CampgroundSequoia National Forest · 6.9 mi
Hospital FlatSequoia National Forest · 7.1 mi
Limestone CampgroundSequoia National Forest · 7.3 mi
Brush Creek Dispersed CampingSequoia National Forest · 7.4 miChico Flat Dispersed CampingSequoia National Forest · 7.4 mi
Goldledge CampgroundSequoia National Forest · 5.2 miFairview CampgroundSequoia National Forest · 6.9 miHospital FlatSequoia National Forest · 7.1 miLimestone CampgroundSequoia National Forest · 7.3 miBrush Creek Dispersed CampingSequoia National Forest · 7.4 miChico Flat Dispersed CampingSequoia National Forest · 7.4 miSource: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026
The weather
the next four days
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
Overnight42°Clear
Saturday59°Sunny3% rain
Saturday Night41°Mostly Clear3% rain
Sunday58°Sunny
NWS forecast for Kernville, CA
Source: National Weather Service, HNX forecast office · Oct 17, 2026
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.
Source: MTJP Threatened Lands map · Oct 9, 2026
Who answers for this land
Horse Meadow Campground is in California’s 20th congressional district. Its representative, Vince Fong (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →
How we know
every fact on this page, and where it came from
Right now: The agency lists it open right now. Its own recreation database, though, flags it not open with no reason or date; the flag is named under How we know all this.
Listed not open: USFS EDW Recreation Opportunities, openstatus field: a not-open flag in a database, with no reason and no date published; read there since Sep 9, 2026. A flag, not a notice, so this page doesn’t call it a closure. · Oct 16, 2026
Season: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026
Elevation: USGS 3DEP elevation point query at this campground’s coordinate · Sep 7, 2026
Tree cover: NLCD Tree Canopy Cover 2024 (USDA Forest Service / MRLC), one 30 m cell at this coordinate · Sep 9, 2026
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: Kernville, CA, 7.9 mi NNE (a census designated place). Straight line.