La Vista Campground - Lake Isabel
1Heads up1 fire 2.5 mi away
- Right now
- Listed not openA database flag with no reason and no date
- A night
- $30–$35Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 2925 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 14 notices
In the agency’s own words
La Vista Campground is situated in a meadow overlooking the west side of the 40-acre Lake Isabel. It is set along the Frontier Pathways and Historic Byway in the Wet Mountains along one of the Colorado Birding Trails. Lake Isabel is one of the few lakes in Colorado developed purely for recreation purposes. Built by the Civilian Conservation Corps, the lake attracts many campers who come to hike, canoe, fish and spend time bird watching. St. Charles Creek flows near the campground and offers additional fishing opportunities. Keep reading
Recreation
Lake Isabel welcomes non-motorized boating and fishing. Brown and brook trout are stocked in the lake and the St. Charles headwaters reap brook trout. Visitors can enjoy hiking, bicycling or motorcycling on either the Snow Slide Trail and Cisneros Trail. The 15-mile Cisneros Trail, also open to ATV riders, leads to the heart of the Wet Mountains, through forests and open, wildflower speckled valleys. Along the way, the trail connects to St. Charles Trail, which heads to St. Charles Peak.
Facilities
Walk-in tent sites are 15 to 50 yards from the parking spurs. RV sites come with electric hookups and all sites include a picnic table, campfire ring and access to vault toilets and drinking water.
Natural Features
Shady pine and aspen trees are scattered throughout the campground. At 8,600 feet, the area enjoys cool summer days, a welcome relief from the heat in the plains far below. The Pike and San Isabel National Forest includes over a million acres of wilderness and over half of Colorado's mountain peaks that reach above 14,000 feet. Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (719) 489-2034.
Nearby Attractions
Charges & Cancellations Cancellations Individual Campsites: Cancellations up to 2 days before a reservation start date incur a $10.00 cancellation fee. A visitor who cancels a reservation the day before or on the day of arrival will pay a $10.00 service fee AND forfeit the first night's use fee including tax and applicable add-on for a campsite. Cancellations for a one-night reservation will forfeit the entire amount paid and will not be subject to an additional service fee. No-Shows A no-show visitor is one who does not arrive at a campground and does not cancel the reservation by check-out time on the day after the scheduled arrival date. Staff will hold a campsite until check-out time on the day following the arrival date. No-shows are assessed $20.00 service fee and forfeit the first night's rate, taxes and applicable add-on for a campsite. Refunds Visitors may submit a refund request through their Recreation.gov profile within 7 days of the end date of their reservation. Refunds will not be issued after the 7 days has ended. Refunds for debit or credit card payments will be issued as a credit to the original bank or credit card used to pay. For check or cash purchases, Recreation.gov will mail a Treasury check for refunds of cash, check, or money order payments to the address associated with the reservation. Treasury check refunds may take up to 6-8 weeks to arrive. In the event of an emergency closure, the Recreation.gov team or facility manager will refund all fees and will attempt to notify you using the contact information within the Recreation.gov visitor profile.
What the agency tells you
This Campground has a limit of 8 people; either 2 tents and 2 vehicles OR 1 RV in each campsite.
NOTE FOR GUESTS WITH CAR TOP TENTS: Most tent sites in this CG are walk in tent sites and you cannot use a camper or truck tent style setup because you cannot get the vehicle down to the site and there is no parking available for this kind of rooftop tent. The tent sites are for tents on the ground only.
Be BEAR AWARE; please keep all food out of sight in approved containers or locked inside your vehicle and remove all food from area after eating
Everything else this campground posts · 11
This is a high elevation facility, please use caution when traveling from lower elevations
This facility also has first-come, first-served sites
No firearms or fireworks
For more information on Pike and San Isabel National Forests, click here
Don't Move Firewood: Prevent the spread of tree-killing organisms by obtaining firewood at or near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org.
Due to the remoteness of the campground, real time information is not available, please call the San Carlos Ranger District for other information at (719) 269-8500.
"Guests can operate ATVs, UTVs, motorbikes, motorcycles, or other motor vehicles entering or leaving their site and CG only while going to or coming from a designated trail. Driving around within the CG loops is not permitted. All posted speed limits must be followed."
Two vehicles included in the camping fee. $10 for additional vehicles.
Water is available in this location via a handpump and/or water spigot. Please DO NOT attach your RV hoses to the water systems we provide. These are made available to you to fill your water jugs/buckets and take back to your site to use. If you need to fill your RV water tanks, please fill your tank before you come to the campground. Thank you!
There is No Dump Station located at this campground. The closest station is located at a nearby campground not run by ExplorUS.
Cellphone service may not work at this location.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 29 · 10 tent-only
- Hookups
- 15 electric
- Longest rig
- 45 ft
- Paved pads
- 8 of 29
- Accessible sites
- 12
- Pets
- Allowed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…table, campfire ring and access to vault toilets and drinking water. Natural Features Shady pine and…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…ring and access to vault toilets and drinking water. Natural Features Shady pine and aspen trees are…”
- Camp host
- On site
- recreation.gov lists “Host”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, Creek, Meadow
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Night sky · 347th darkest of 522 in CO
- Bortle 3
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 25 of the 29 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 · 15
What you actually pay
“$10 for additional vehicles.” · the U.S. Forest Service’s own agency notice
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $30–$35 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.
“Cancellations Individual Campsites: Cancellations up to 2 days before a reservation start date incur a $10.00 cancellation fee. A visitor who cancels a reservation the day before or on the day of arrival will pay a $10.00 service fee AND forfeit the first night's use fee including tax and applicable add-on for a cam…” · this campground’s own no-show terms
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 · 7
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
31 records · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 25 mapped sitesAll 31 records
Toilet distances are OpenStreetMap’s, measured for 29 of the 31 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. 25 of the 31 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
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.
| LAKE | 011 | rv electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | 107 ft | 613 ft | 224 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 012 | standard electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | 45 ft | 593 ft | 232 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 013 | standard electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | yes | 18 ft | 551 ft | 208 ft | $35 |
| LAKE | 014 | standard electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | yes | 18 ft | 535 ft | 215 ft | $35 |
| LAKE | 015 | rv electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | 23 ft | 518 ft | 199 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 016 | standard electric | 30 ft | 15 amp | yes | 71 ft | 448 ft | 206 ft | $35 |
| LAKE | 017 | type not stated | 45 ft | 15 amp | yes | 462 ft | 96 ft | ||
| LAKE | 018 | standard electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | yes | 71 ft | 465 ft | 92 ft | $35 |
| LAKE | 019 | type not stated | 40 ft | 15 amp | yes | 500 ft | 63 ft | ||
| LAKE | 020 | standard electric | 25 ft | 15 amp | 52 ft | 520 ft | 68 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 021 | standard electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | yes | 32 ft | 571 ft | 69 ft | $35 |
| LAKE | 022 | standard electric | 40 ft | 15 amp | yes | 32 ft | 590 ft | 54 ft | $35 |
| LAKE | 023 | standard electric | 25 ft | 15 amp | yes | 59 ft | 594 ft | 40 ft | $35 |
| LAKE | 024 | type not stated | 20 ft | 15 amp | yes | 587 ft | 42 ft | ||
| LAKE | 025 | standard electric | 45 ft | 15 amp | 114 ft | 701 ft | 157 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 026 | standard electric | 30 ft | 15 amp | 96 ft | 702 ft | 151 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 027 | standard electric | 32 ft | 15 amp | 96 ft | 669 ft | 164 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 028 | standard electric | 40 ft | 15 amp | 128 ft | 615 ft | 234 ft | $35 | |
| LAKE | 029 | type not stated | 45 ft | 15 amp | yes | 544 ft | 298 ft | ||
| VIST | 001 | tent only nonelectric | yes | 104 ft | 418 ft | 664 ft | $30 | ||
| VIST | 002 | tent only nonelectric | 104 ft | 319 ft | 605 ft | $30 | |||
| VIST | 003 | tent only nonelectric | 61 ft | 374 ft | 486 ft | $30 | |||
| VIST | 004 | tent only nonelectric | 61 ft | 424 ft | 445 ft | $30 | |||
| VIST | 005 | tent only nonelectric | 53 ft | 243 ft | 314 ft | $30 | |||
| VIST | 006 | tent only nonelectric | 53 ft | 236 ft | 327 ft | $30 | |||
| WALKIN 1 | 008 | tent only nonelectric | 85 ft | 440 ft | 86 ft | $30 | |||
| WALKIN 1 | 009 | tent only nonelectric | 64 ft | 392 ftLake Isabel | 167 ft | $30 | |||
| WALKIN 1 | 010 | tent only nonelectric | 64 ft | 331 ftLake Isabel | 231 ft | $30 | |||
| WALKIN 1 | XXX | unnamed record | 45 ft | yes | |||||
| WALKIN 2 | 007 | tent only nonelectric | 61 ft | 231 ft | 353 ft | $30 | |||
| WALKIN 2 | XXX | unnamed record | yes |
The agency files 2 more records here that aren’t sites for the night. It types every one of them MANAGEMENT rather than a campsite. They’re in the table above, marked for what they are, and none of them is counted as a site.
25 of 31 listed
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Southside Campground - Lake IsabelSan Isabel National Forest · 0.2 mi
St Charles Campground - Lake IsabelSan Isabel National Forest · 0.4 mi
Lake Isabel CabinSan Isabel National Forest · 0.6 miPonderosa Group CampgroundSan Isabel National Forest · 0.8 mi
Ponderosa Group - Lake IsabelSan Isabel National Forest · 1.2 mi
Spruce Group - Lake IsabelSan Isabel National Forest · 1.2 miFrom Pueblo, go 25 miles south on Interstate 25 to exit 74. Drive west 18 miles on State Highway 165. Turn into the main entrance at Lake Isabel Recreation Area, then turn right into the first campground on the right (about 1.25 miles).
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Beulah Valley, CO
Typical weather
Typical October night 33°F, day 62°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 17°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
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
La Vista Campground - Lake Isabel is in Colorado’s 7th congressional district. Its representative, Brittany Pettersen (D), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: A+. See every public-lands vote →