Iron Ridge - Lake Vesuvius
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $15–$20Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 3332 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 9 notices
In the agency’s own words
Iron Ridge is one of two campgrounds in the Vesuvius Recreation Area in southeastern Ohio's Wayne National Forest. Iron Ridge offers a great location for outdoor recreation, with activities like boating, swimming and fishing on Lake Vesuvius. Horseback riding and hiking are also available in the rolling hills surrounding the campground. Keep reading
Recreation
Boating, fishing and swimming on Lake Vesuvius are the area's most popular activities. Anglers may catch bass, catfish, crappie or bluegill. More than 40 miles of trails exist in the area, with trailheads beginning at or near the campground. A 1/2-mile hiking trail connects the campground to Lake Vesuvius. Lake Shore Trail offers an 8-mile loop around the lake and shorter trails lead to Rock House Cave, a grand, tunnel-like sandstone cave that was once used by Native Americans for shelter.
Facilities
The campground offers multiple sites for RV camping, many of which have electric hookups. Some first-come, first-serve sites are also available. Each campsite can accommodate up to eight individuals. Each site is equipped with a picnic table and campfire ring with grill. The campground has accessible flush toilets, showers and drinking water. Campsites 9, 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, 25, 26, and 27 all have access to shared water spigots, while all other campsites have their own individual water-hookups. A dump station is located on-site.
Natural Features
Iron Ridge Campground is located on a wooded ridge above 143-acre Lake Vesuvius. A scenic forest of mature eastern hardwoods covers the area.
Nearby Attractions
The closest town is Ironton, Ohio, less than 10 miles from the campground.
What the agency tells you
Additional fees will be collected at the campground for extra vehicles
Camping or the establishment of a campsite within the Wayne National Forest shall be limited to a period of time not to exceed 14 days in any 30 day time period.
Campers may not occupy an individual developed campsite with more than eight persons at one time.
Everything else this campground posts · 6
Campers may not occupy more than three developed camping units at one time (one RV and two tents sites).
Pets are permitted within recreation areas, but must be caged, on a leash not longer than six feet, or under other physical restrictive control.
Click here for more information on the Wayne National Forest
Don't move firewood: To limit the spread of invasive tree-killing pests, firewood from outside the area is not permitted. Some states have quarantines and may confiscate your firewood. Please help protect our forests from invasive species by obtaining your firewood at or near your camping destination and burning it on-site. Visit dontmovefirewood.org for more information.
Reservation Cut-Off Window: Reservations must be made 4 days prior to arrival. Any unreserved campsites within the 4 day cut-off window are no longer reservable and only available on a first-come, first-serve basis.
State of Ohio Buckeye Pass is not accepted at any Wayne National Forest recreation sites that charges a fee.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 33 · 7 tent-only, 4 walk-in
- Hookups
- 20 electric, 24 water, 1 sewer
- Longest rig
- 45 ft
- Paved pads
- 23 of 33
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- “…grill. The campground has accessible flush toilets, showers and drinking water. Campsites 9, 19, 20,…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…accessible flush toilets, showers and drinking water. Campsites 9, 19, 20, 21, 23, 24, 25, 26, and 27…”
- Dump station
- Yes
- recreation.gov lists “Dump Station”
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake
- Boating
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Hunting
- Night sky · 12th darkest of 20 in OH
- Bortle 4
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 32 of the 33 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.
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 · 17
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $15–$20 a night, plus one $8 recreation.gov reservation fee for the booking. A weekend here means Friday and Saturday night, booked once. Optional charges (an extra vehicle, a second tent, a dump-station fee) are listed separately and aren’t in this total.
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
34 records · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 32 mapped sitesAll 34 records
Toilet distances are OpenStreetMap’s, measured for 34 of the 34 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. 32 of the 34 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 001_HOST | type not stated | 45 ft | 30 amp | 1,554 ft | 672 ft | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 002 | standard electric | 45 ft | 50/30 amp | 117 ft | 1,668 ft | 728 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 003 | standard electric | 45 ft | 50/30 amp | 64 ft | 1,594 ft | 619 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 004 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 64 ft | 1,535 ft | 556 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 005 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 88 ft | 1,438 ft | 506 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 006 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 88 ft | 1,453 ft | 465 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 007 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 91 ft | 1,354 ft | 421 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 008 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 104 ft | 1,256 ft | 330 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 009 | tent only nonelectric | 238 ft | 1,031 ft | 203 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 010 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 109 ft | 1,177 ft | 96 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 011 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 78 ft | 1,262 ft | 205 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 012 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 64 ft | 1,240 ftLake Vesuvius | 282 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 013 | standard electric | 35 ft | 30 amp | 64 ft | 1,238 ftLake Vesuvius | 322 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 014 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 87 ft | 1,140 ftLake Vesuvius | 363 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 015 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 87 ft | 1,127 ftLake Vesuvius | 408 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 016 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 104 ft | 1,000 ftLake Vesuvius | 494 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 017 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 72 ft | 1,042 ftLake Vesuvius | 461 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 018 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 72 ft | 971 ftLake Vesuvius | 533 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 019 | tent only electric | 20 amp | 44 ft | 1,135 ft | 372 ft | $20 | |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 020 | tent only electric | 20 amp | 44 ft | 1,091 ft | 368 ft | $20 | |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 021 | tent only electric | 20 amp | 74 ft | 1,071 ft | 436 ft | $20 | |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 022 | standard electric | 45 ft | 30 amp | 127 ft | 1,065 ftLake Vesuvius | 562 ft | $20 |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 023 | tent only nonelectric | 60 ft | 1,029 ftLake Vesuvius | 748 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 024 | walk to | 49 ft | 981 ftLake Vesuvius | 850 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 025 | walk to | 60 ft | 1,043 ft | 732 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 026 | walk to | 49 ft | 1,029 ftLake Vesuvius | 846 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 027 | walk to | 77 ft | 1,031 ft | 803 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 028 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 152 ft | 626 ftLake Vesuvius | 1,739 ft | $15 | |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 029 HOST | host pad | 58 ft | 30 amp | 750 ftLake Vesuvius | 1,674 ft | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 030 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 152 ft | 723 ftLake Vesuvius | 1,758 ft | $15 | |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 031 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | 152 ft | 632 ftLake Vesuvius | 1,778 ft | $15 | |
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 032 | tent only nonelectric | 141 ft | 814 ftLake Vesuvius | 1,591 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 033 | tent only nonelectric | 141 ft | 951 ftLake Vesuvius | 1,501 ft | $15 | ||
| IRON RIDGE LAKE VESUVIUS | 034 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 152 ft | 744 ftLake Vesuvius | 1,590 ft | $15 |
The agency files 1 more record here that isn’t a site for the night. It names it a host pad. It’s in the table above, marked for what it is, and it isn’t counted as a site.
25 of 34 listed
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Lake Vesuvius Recreation AreaWayne National Forest · 0.9 miOak Hill CampgroundWayne National Forest · 1.0 miPine Knob LoopWayne National Forest · 1.1 mi
Oak Hill - Lake VesuviusWayne National Forest · 1.1 miTwo Point Group CampgroundWayne National Forest · 1.3 miFrom U.S. Highway 52 at Ironton, Take State Route 93 north for 6 miles to the Lake Vesuvius Road (County Road 29). Turn east toward Lake Vesuvius and travel 1 mile to the recreation area.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Ironton, OH
Typical weather
Typical October night 40°F, day 68°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 20°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
Iron Ridge - Lake Vesuvius is in Ohio’s 2nd congressional district. Its representative, Dave Taylor (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →