Nelson Point
- Right now
- Closed for the seasonOut of the season the agency publishes
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
- Season
- June 2 – September 12Open June 2 through September 12
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 12 notices
In the agency’s own words
Nelson Point Campground is situated along the Sacramento Arm of Shasta Lake, easily accessible from 1-5 and located nearby many other recreation areas on Shasta Lake. Keep reading
Recreation
The nearest public boat ramp is 6 miles away at Antlers. Nearby lakeside resorts offer boat rentals and fuel. Shasta Lake is popular for power and non-motorized boating, fishing and water skiing. Anglers can fish for trout, catfish, Chinook salmon, crappie, bluegill, white sturgeon, brown bullhead and bass.
Facilities
Nelson Point is open for walk-ins April 1-May 13. The campground is available for group rental on a reservation basis from May 13-September 11. Reservations are not allowed for individual family camping during the peak season unless the entire campground is reserved. All campsites have a grill or stove, picnic tables, fire rings, tent pads, bear boxes and paved parking spurs. Vault toilets are provided, but there is no drinking water.
Natural Features
Shasta-Trinity is the largest national forest in California with a diverse landscape encompassing five wilderness areas, hundreds of mountain lakes and 6,278 miles of streams and rivers. Lake Shasta sits at an elevation of 1,067 feet, with 365 miles of shoreline punctuated by steep mountains blanketed in manzanita and evergreens. A snow-capped Mount Shasta, the second-tallest mountain in the Cascade Range, looms in the distance.
Nearby Attractions
Lake Shasta Caverns is located on the McCloud Arm of Shasta Lake in an area known as the Grey Rocks. Tours are given daily at this privately owned facility.
What the agency tells you
Group reservation holders must contact Shasta Recreation Office at least 1 week prior to arrival for a combination code to access campground; failure to do so could lead to a locked facility without access for a night or longer and no refund
No drinking water is provided
Maximum group size is 75
Everything else this campground posts · 9
Average maximum trailer size is 16 feet
Keep food in bear-proof containers
Poison oak is abundant in the area
There is a $16 daily fee for the use of Antlers public boat ramp
Click here for more information on this campground
Click here to learn more about the Shasta-Trinity National Forest
Don't Move Firewood: Protect California's forests from tree-killing pests by buying your firewood locally and burning it on-site. For more information visit firewood.ca.gov.
Check-in time 3 P.M. and Check-out time 12 P.M.
No Amplified Sound!
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 group
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 30 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…bear boxes and paved parking spurs. Vault toilets are provided, but there is no drinking water.…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…spurs. Vault toilets are provided, but there is no drinking water. Natural Features Shasta-Trinity is the largest…”
- Boat ramp
- Yes
- Bear boxes
- Yes
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River, Creek, Beach
- Boating
- Fishing
- Water sports
- Night sky · 689th darkest of 1,201 in CA
- Bortle 3
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 · 25
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 Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
10 records · the site map
All 10 records
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 10 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| AREA NELSON POINT | 001 | group standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 210 ft | $120 |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX | unnamed record | 35 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX1 | unnamed record | 136 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX2 | unnamed record | 49 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX3 | unnamed record | 149 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX4 | unnamed record | 164 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX5 | unnamed record | 108 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX6 | unnamed record | 129 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX7 | unnamed record | 171 ft | $23–$110 | |
| AREA NELSON POINT | XXX8 | unnamed record | 207 ft | $23–$110 |
The agency files 9 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.
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
Salt Creek Dispersed Area (CA)Whiskeytown Shasta-Trinity National Recreation Area · 0.6 mi
Lakeshore EastWhiskeytown Shasta-Trinity National Recreation Area · 2.7 mi
Gregory Beach Dispersed Area (CA)Whiskeytown Shasta-Trinity National Recreation Area · 2.8 mi
Gregory Creek Group CampgroundWhiskeytown Shasta-Trinity National Recreation Area · 3.0 mi
Beehive Dispersed Area (CA)Whiskeytown Shasta-Trinity National Recreation Area · 3.0 mi
Antlers (Shasta Lake, CA)Whiskeytown Shasta-Trinity National Recreation Area · 3.2 miFrom Redding, California: Take I-5 to Gilman Road/Gregory Creek Rd. Go west to Salt Creek exit, and then north to Conflict Point Road (From the north, take Salt Creek exit and then go south to Conflict Point Road). Go approximately .5 miles to the campground.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Lakehead, CA
Typical weather
Typical June night 63°F, day 88°F.
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
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
Nelson Point is in California’s 1st congressional district. Whoever holds it votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. See how its representative votes on public lands →
Our roster still carries Doug LaMalfa for this district and the current federal record doesn’t list them as sitting, so we’re not naming a representative here until the two agree.