Lane Spring Recreation Area
We don’t think it should be. Every campground should hold some sites for whoever drives up.Tell your representative →
- Right now
- OpenThe agency lists it open
- A night
- $15–$30Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 21All of them booked ahead
- Season
- March 1 – October 31Open March 1 through October 31
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 3 notices
In the agency’s own words
Lane Spring Recreation Area provides a peaceful setting along Little Piney Creek and a scenic patio overlooking beautiful Lane Spring. A large, accessible picnic area with two pavilions can be reserved. The site has multiple first come first serve campsites if an overnight stay is desired. A variety of outdoor recreation opportunities are in the area. Keep reading
Recreation
Trout fishing is popular along the portion of the creek nearest Lane Spring, as it is managed by a wild trout fishery. The fish population is self-sustained instead of being stocked. Only artificial lures and flies may be used, and a daily limit is applied of one trout measuring 18 inches or longer. Bass and sunfish are also plentiful. The 1.25-mile Blossom Rock Trail and the 1.5-mile Cedar Bluff Trail traverse through lush bottomland vegetation with abundant wildflowers, before climbing to views of the river and rock outcroppings. Birding and wildlife viewing is popular along the trails.
Facilities
The recreation area offers a picnic area with two group picnic pavilions, each equipped with tables, grills and electric outlets. Each can accommodate up to 100 people. If unreserved, the pavilions are available on a first-come, first-served basis. Each pavillion has 10-20 parking spots with handicap accessible paths to pavillions. These parking spots are not reservable, however there are additional parking spaces that have access to the spring. Additional individual picnic sites are available near the spring. Several family campsites are available as well. Each site is equipped with a table, lantern post and campfire ring with grill. Vault toilets and drinking water are provided.
Natural Features
The recreation area is situated along Little Piney Creek, with some waterfront campsites available. A beautiful hardwood forest covers the area, which lies in the northwestern portion of the Mark Twain National Forest. An accessible shaded stone patio overlooks tranquil Lane Spring, a bubbling spring with watercress and native plant species. It is bordered by a variety of trees, including sycamore, cypress, oak and many others.
What the agency tells you
Additional fees will be collected at the campground for extra vehicles and for parking in the day-use area
Click here for more information on the Mark Twain 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.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 21 · 3 group
- Hookups
- 10 electric
- Paved pads
- All
- Accessible sites
- 21
- Pets
- Allowed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…post and campfire ring with grill. Vault toilets and drinking water are provided. Natural Features…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…ring with grill. Vault toilets and drinking water are provided. Natural Features The recreation area…”
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- River, Creek
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Water sports
- Wildlife viewing
Full this Saturdayread 14:49 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBookedNot reservable
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday. 2 are free on Wed, Oct 21. read 14:49 UTC Why the weekend fills and the week doesn’t
Watch for a cancellation
Watch this campground
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
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $15–$30 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
recreation.gov availability, read 14:49 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
25 records · the site map
All 25 records
Toilet distances are OpenStreetMap’s, measured for 2 of the 25 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. 18 of the 25 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| DGWP | Dogwood Pavilion | day use | 15 amp | yes | 254 ft | 53 ft | $50 |
| Loop A | 01 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 02 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 03 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 04 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 05 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 06 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 07 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 08 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop A | 09 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop A | 10 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 11 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop A | 12 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 13 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop A | 14 | standard electric | 15 amp | yes | $25 | ||
| Loop A | 15 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop A | 16 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop A | 17 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop A | 18 | standard nonelectric | 15 amp | yes | $15–$30 | ||
| Loop B | 19 | group standard nonelectric | yes | ||||
| Loop B | 20 | group standard nonelectric | yes | ||||
| Loop B | 21 | group standard nonelectric | yes | ||||
| MANAGEMENT SITES | XXX | day use | yes | $33.97 | |||
| MANAGEMENT SITES | XXXX | day use | yes | $33.97 | |||
| REDB | Redbud Pavilion | day use | 15 amp | yes | 399 ft | 107 ft | $50 |
The agency files 4 more records here that aren’t sites for the night. It files them as day use. They’re in the table above, marked for what they are, and none of them is counted as a site.
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Cedar Grove CampgroundOzark National Scenic Riverways · 28 miDee Murray CampgroundOzark National Scenic Riverways · 29 mi
AkersOzark National Scenic Riverways · 32 miAkers Group CampgroundOzark National Scenic Riverways · 32 miRed Bluff Recreation AreaMark Twain National Forest · 37 miFrom Rolla, Missouri, travel 12 miles south on U.S. Highway 63, then continue 1 mile west on Entrance Road.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Edgar Springs, MO
Typical weather
Typical October night 47°F, day 69°F.
Coldest night of the open season: typical March night 35°F. Bring the bag rated for it.
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 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 · a letter you can send
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Lane Spring Recreation Area is in Missouri’s 8th congressional district. Its representative, Jason Smith (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →
Who can change it · 3
Two offices, two different asks. The draft to the agency asks it to set aside a published share of the sites here for whoever drives up. The draft to Congress asks why that share is zero and presses for a published minimum at the campgrounds it funds.
- The member who votes the moneyJason SmithU.S. Representative · Missouri’s 8th district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationEric SchmittU.S. Senator · Missouri
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJosh HawleyU.S. Senator · Missouri
Read the draft, or change the wording
For the camper who turned up, or tried to book, and couldn’t get in. Every draft is written from this campground’s own record (its agency, its unit, its site count and its own weekend) and the buttons above copy whichever wording is selected here.
Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.
Subject Walk-up camping at Lane Spring Recreation Area, Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri
Dear Jason Smith, I’m a constituent in Missouri’s 8th district. I tried to camp at Lane Spring Recreation Area, Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri, and couldn’t. All 21 sites at Lane Spring Recreation Area are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Lane Spring Recreation Area keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Lane Spring Recreation Area. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund. The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them. Sent about Lane Spring Recreation Area (Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.
Subject Walk-up camping at Lane Spring Recreation Area, Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri
Dear Eric Schmitt, I’m a constituent in Missouri. I tried to camp at Lane Spring Recreation Area, Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri, and couldn’t. All 21 sites at Lane Spring Recreation Area are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Lane Spring Recreation Area keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Lane Spring Recreation Area. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund. The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them. Sent about Lane Spring Recreation Area (Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.
Subject Walk-up camping at Lane Spring Recreation Area, Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri
Dear Josh Hawley, I’m a constituent in Missouri. I tried to camp at Lane Spring Recreation Area, Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri, and couldn’t. All 21 sites at Lane Spring Recreation Area are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Lane Spring Recreation Area keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Lane Spring Recreation Area. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund. The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them. Sent about Lane Spring Recreation Area (Mark Twain National Forest, Missouri) via campanac.com