Kathleen Lake Cabin
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 11 notices
In the agency’s own words
Kathleen Lake Cabin offers recreation, relaxation and a unique wilderness lodging experience on the western section of Admiralty Island in the Tongass National Forest. The remote site offers a scenic setting for fishing, boating and wildlife viewing. Access to the cabin is floatplane only. Visitors are responsible for their own travel arrangements and safety, and must bring several of their own amenities. Keep reading
Recreation
Anglers will find Kathleen Lake to be a scenic setting for catching a variety of fish including rainbow trout, Dolly Varden and northern pike. Visitors are welcome to use the skiff with oars available at the cabin. Visitors must bring personal floatation devices (life vests).
Facilities
The primitive, pre-cut cedar, A-frame style log cabin sleeps up to six people on wooden bunkbeds without mattresses and sleeping loft. The cabin is equipped with a table, benches, an oil stove for heat and an outside toilet. Other amenities include cooking counters, shelves, cupboard space and a broom. The cabin does not have running water or electricity, and visitors must bring their own food, water, #1 stove oil (, sleeping bags, sleeping pads, cook stoves, matches, cooking gear/utensils, light source, toilet paper, first aid kit and garbage bags. The lands surrounding the Forest Service property and cabin belong to the Shee Atika Corporation. A permit is required for any activity on corporation land. Entry without a permit will be considered trespassing and subject to legal action. The cost of the permit for noncommercial users is $25/person for up to 7 consecutive days. This fee-based permit was instituted by Shee Atika during the summer of 2004. To obtain a permit, call the Shee Atika office at (907) 747-3534 or toll free at 1-800-478-3534. (The forested land immediately surrounding the cabin is Forest Service land and does not require a permit.
Natural Features
The cabin sits on level ground within steps of a small beach. Although this cabin sits beneath a canopy of old-growth trees, much of the surrounding area is private land, and has been clearcut. The area around the cabin shows a patchwork pattern of logged and unlogged areas. Dense spruce and hemlock forests, glacier-fed streams and muskeg define the surrounding landscape, while rocky, glacier-capped peaks rise in the distance. Wildlife in the area abounds. Sitka black-tailed deer stay well hidden in the dense forest, bald eagles are found in treetops along most beaches and migratory waterfowl find habitat on numerous lakes. Brown bears are in abundance.
What the agency tells you
This facility is located in an extremely remote and wild area; before making a reservation, become aware of bear, water, and weather safety (including cold)
Recreating in Alaska can present both obvious and hidden dangers; please be aware of your surroundings and be prepared for extended stays due to occasionally poor weather
All garbage and food must be packed out
Everything else this campground posts · 8
Before digging for clams, become familiar with paralytic shellfish poisoning (PSP ) and current regulations for size and quantity limits. Cases of PSP from eating razor clams are relatively rare, but they have been reported in Alaska
The lake is on a flight path and has substantial overhead plane traffic
Contact the Admiralty Island National Monument at 907-586-8800 prior to arrival for information about safety precautions
Use of this cabin by a commercial operator, such as an outfitter or guide, is prohibited
Same day reservation are available for this cabin
Learn more about Tongass National Forest
Don't Move Firewood: Prevent the spread of tree-killing pests by purchasing firewood near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org.
To ensure users have capability of using the skiffs, it is recommended that they bring their own 8 or 9 foot oars. Oars are provided once on an annual maintenance trip but are not guaranteed to still be on site or in working order.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Yes, the record doesn't say what kind
- “The cabin is equipped with a table, benches, an oil stove for heat and an outside toilet.”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…cupboard space and a broom. The cabin does not have running water or electricity, and visitors must bring their own…”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, Creek, Beach
- Boating
- Fishing
- Wildlife viewing
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 Oct 1, 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 KATHLEEN LAKE CABIN | A01 | cabin nonelectric | 91 ft | $25 |
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
Florence Lake (East) CabinAdmiralty Island National Monument · 6.9 mi
Windfall Harbor ShelterAdmiralty Island National Monument · 13 mi
Young Lake (South) CabinAdmiralty Island National Monument · 17 mi
Young Lake (North) CabinAdmiralty Island National Monument · 17 mi
Kennel Creek Cabin (AK)19 mi
Admiralty Cove CabinAdmiralty Island National Monument · 19 miAccess to the cabin is by floatplane. It is about a 30-minute flight from Juneau. In fall, winter and early spring, the cabin may be inaccessible due to frozen lake surface (floatplanes cannot land). The lake is normally ice free from mid-May through November. Refer to USGS topographic map Sitka D-2, D-3.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Juneau, AK
Typical weather
Typical October night 37°F, day 47°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 24°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
Kathleen Lake Cabin is in Alaska’s at-large congressional district. Its representative, Nick Begich (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →