Mortimer Campground
We don’t think it should be. Every campground should hold some sites for whoever drives up.Tell your representative →
- Right now
- OpenListed open; its database flags it not open
- A night
- $20–$30Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 17All of them booked ahead
- Season
- March 31 – October 31Open March 31 through October 31
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 1 notices
In the agency’s own words
Mortimer Campground is a small campground nestled within the Wilson Creek Wild and Scenic River Corridor south of Grandfather Mountain. Located at the site of an old Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp, the 17-site campground is surrounded by lush forests, gentle streams, and a large scenic river popular for swimming, fishing, and kayaking. Keep reading
Recreation
Visitors to the campground can enjoy a variety of activities including fishing, swimming, day hiking, mountain biking, kayaking, picnicking, and scenic driving. Swimming holes along Thorps Creek provide wading opportunities on hot summer days. Nearby Wilson Creek, designated as a National Wild and Scenic River in 2000, is well known for its excellent trout fishing, swimming, kayaking, and rugged features. History buffs will enjoy exploring the remnants of the once booming timber town of Mortimer as well as an old CCC work center. Two Forest Service trails depart from the campground. The Thorps Creek trail provides a short (approx. 1/4 mile) hike to Thorps Creek Falls. The more strenuous Schoolhouse Ridge Trail connects to the campground via the .2 mile Bill Vines trail and provides a 3 mile ridgeline excursion with beautiful views before connecting to the Wilson Ridge Trail. Many other Forest Service trails are within a short drive of the Campground, including Hunt Fish Falls, North Harper Creek Falls, and Little Lost Cove Cliffs. The area also boasts a network of scenic mountain biking trails.
Facilities
The campground provides a variety of campsites. There is an upper and lower loop. The lower loop features 5 tent-only walk-in sites with a central parking lot. The upper loop includes 14 fully accessible, barrier free sites which can accommodate small RVs up to 35ft. Most sites include a tent pad, picnic table, lantern post, and fire ring. Flush toilets, hot showers, running water, and bear-proof trash and recycling receptacles are provided. A Campground host is on site to provide visitor assistance.
Natural Features
Located in a rich mountain hardwood forest at an elevation of 1,400 ft., Mortimer Campground provides a secluded streamside setting shaded by large hemlocks and pine trees. Thorps Creek runs along the east side of the campground before feeding into the Wild and Scenic Wilson Creek, a popular destination for a variety of activities. Hardwood forests cover the mountain peaks on either side of the valley and multiple mountain feeder creeks can be found nearby. The Mortimer area provides beautiful scenery year-round, from stunning fall foliage displays to abundant spring and summer wildflowers.
Nearby Attractions
The Wilson Creek Visitor Center is 3.2 miles from the Mortimer Campground and provides information on the Wilson Creek area and has a photograph and artifact collection that tells the history of the area. The towns of Blowing Rock and Morganton are located within an hour’s drive of the campground, to the north and south respectively. Both towns offer a variety of restaurants, gas stations, grocery stores, and medical facilities. The Julian Price Memorial Park and Campground is located 24 miles north of Mortimer Campground and is a well-known destination for hiking, canoeing, fishing, and camping. Mortimer Campground is 21 miles away from Linville Falls, and the Linville Gorge Wilderness Area. The Gorge offers breathtaking views and numerous hiking trails. The Campground is 17 miles from the popular Grandfather Mountain State Park, the highest peak on the eastern escarpment of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Contact Info This location is unstaffed. To speak with our main office for general information, please call: (828) 652-2144.
What the agency tells you
- Campground is open April 1st thru November 1st - All sites (1-17) can be reserved at least three days in advance - While the standard non-electric sites will support RVs, there are no RV amenities - The facility is located near a bear sanctuary; be aware, keep a clean camp, store all food items in closed containers or locked inside vehicles - There is no cell phone service at the campground - Check in time: 3pm, Check out time: noon - Quiet hours are 10pm to 6am - For more information, please call the Grandfather Ranger District at 828-652-2144
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 17 · 17 tent-only, 1 group
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- ACCESSIBLE FLUSH TOILETS on 17 of 17 campsite records
- Showers
- Accessible Showers
- ACCESSIBLE SHOWERS on 17 of 17 campsite records
Around the campground
- On the water
- River, Creek
Full this Saturdayread 15:22 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBooked
Every one of the 17 sites on offer is taken this Friday and Saturday. 12 are free on Mon, Oct 19. read 15:22 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 · 30
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $20–$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 15:22 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
17 sites
All 17 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. 16 of the 17 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| Lower | 1 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Lower | 2 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Lower | 3 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Lower | 4 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Lower | 5 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 10 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 11 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 12 Group Site | group tent only area nonelectric | |
| Upper | 13 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 14 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 15 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 16 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 17 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 6 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 7 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 8 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
| Upper | 9 | tent only nonelectric | $20–$30 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the phone number
Where it is
Linville Falls CampgroundBlue Ridge Parkway · 9.7 mi
Julian Price CampgroundBlue Ridge Parkway · 10 mi
Johns River Road Backcountry CampingBlue Ridge Parkway · 11 mi
Crabtree Falls CampgroundBlue Ridge Parkway · 25 miDennis Cove Recreation AreaCherokee National Forest · 27 miThe weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Linville, NC
Typical weather
Typical October night 46°F, day 71°F.
Coldest night of the open season: typical March night 36°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
Mortimer Campground is in North Carolina’s 5th congressional district. Its representative, Virginia Foxx (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 moneyVirginia FoxxU.S. Representative · North Carolina’s 5th district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationTed BuddU.S. Senator · North Carolina
- Your senator, on the same appropriationThom TillisU.S. Senator · North Carolina
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 Mortimer Campground, Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina
Dear Virginia Foxx, I’m a constituent in North Carolina’s 5th district. I tried to camp at Mortimer Campground, Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina, and couldn’t. All 17 sites at Mortimer Campground are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, all 17 sites recreation.gov was offering there were already booked. 1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Mortimer Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Mortimer Campground. 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 Mortimer Campground (Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina) 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 Mortimer Campground, Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina
Dear Ted Budd, I’m a constituent in North Carolina. I tried to camp at Mortimer Campground, Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina, and couldn’t. All 17 sites at Mortimer Campground are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, all 17 sites recreation.gov was offering there were already booked. 1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Mortimer Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Mortimer Campground. 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 Mortimer Campground (Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina) 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 Mortimer Campground, Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina
Dear Thom Tillis, I’m a constituent in North Carolina. I tried to camp at Mortimer Campground, Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina, and couldn’t. All 17 sites at Mortimer Campground are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, all 17 sites recreation.gov was offering there were already booked. 1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Mortimer Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Mortimer Campground. 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 Mortimer Campground (Pisgah National Forest, North Carolina) via campanac.com