New Spicer Meadows
1Heads up1 fire 30 mi away
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $30–$60Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 5755 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 10 notices
In the agency’s own words
Spicer Reservoir has a surface area of 2,000 acres when full. Maximum speed on the lower portion of the lake is 10 mph; the upper portion, surrounded by the Carson-Iceberg Wilderness, is managed for non-motorized uses only. Spicer Reservoir visitors enjoy camping, fishing, hiking and horseback riding. The campground offers 60 family sites and 1 group site. Keep reading
Recreation
Camping fishing non-motorized water activies
What the agency tells you
Bears frequent the area; use appropiate food containers
There are no electric/water/sewer site hook-ups at this facility
Please Note: One vehicle per single site. Most sites can accommodate 1 extra vehicle that is not included with the reservation fee. Extra vehicles will be charged a $5 per night fee and collected at the campground.
Everything else this campground posts · 7
Fire Restrictions: Fire restrictions may be imposed at any time due to hot, dry weather conditions, at which time campfires and charcoal fires may not be allowed; call (530) 644-6048 for local information and conditions.
Reserved Sites will be held until check out time (NOON) the day following your arrival date. Sites must be occupied by the checkout time of that following day to hold a reservation or the site will be forfeited and released to other guests. Once your reservation start date has begun, neither the Recreation.gov Contact Center nor the campground manager will be able to modify your reservation.
Refunds: Refund requests made through www.recreation.gov will be charged a $10 processing fee. This fee is retained by the reservation service contractor along with the non-refundable reservation fee. All requests for the return of the non-refundable reservation fee and the cancellation fee will be declined by the campground concessionaire as they did not receive these fees (these are the fees retained by the reservation contractor, a different entity).
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.
First Come First Serve sites remain listed as FF for the entire season. They will not show occupied/available as the status of these sites is ever changing. You must be on site at the campground to claim a FF site. No guarantees upon arrival that these FF sites will be avaiable.
There are fees to move from a reserved site to first come first serve site. Site Transfer Policy
Click here for more information on the Stanislaus National Forest
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 57 · 1 group
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 72 ft
- Paved pads
- All
- Accessible sites
- 2
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- VAULT TOILETS on 57 of 57 campsite records
- Drinking water
- Yes
- DRINKING WATER on 57 of 57 campsite records, WATER SPIGOT on 57 of 57 campsite records
Around the campground
- On the water
- Reservoir, Lake
- Night sky · 522nd darkest of 1,201 in CA
- Bortle 3
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 55 of the 57 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
“Extra vehicles will be charged a $5 per night fee and collected at the campground.” · the U.S. Forest Service’s own agency notice
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $30–$60 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 · 6
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
57 sites
All 57 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. 55 of the 57 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| Family Campground | 1 | type not stated | |||
| Family Campground | 10/11 | standard nonelectric | 51 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 12 | standard nonelectric | 54 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 13 | standard nonelectric | 53 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 14 | standard nonelectric | 54 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 15 | standard nonelectric | 51 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 16 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 17 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 18 | standard nonelectric | 53 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 19 | standard nonelectric | 42 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 2 | standard nonelectric | $30–$60 | ||
| Family Campground | 20 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 21 | standard nonelectric | 58 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 22 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 23 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 24 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 25 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 26 | standard nonelectric | 44 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 27 | standard nonelectric | 44 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 28 | standard nonelectric | 42 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 29 | standard nonelectric | 57 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 3 | standard nonelectric | 36 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 30/31 | standard nonelectric | 42 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 32/33 | standard nonelectric | 42 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 34 | standard nonelectric | 43 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 35 | standard nonelectric | 59 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 36 | standard nonelectric | 51 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 37 | standard nonelectric | 59 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 38 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 39 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 4 | standard nonelectric | $30–$60 | ||
| Family Campground | 40 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 41 | standard nonelectric | 54 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 42 | standard nonelectric | 42 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 43 | standard nonelectric | 53 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 44 | standard nonelectric | 68 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 45 | standard nonelectric | 46 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 46 | standard nonelectric | 54 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 47 | standard nonelectric | 48 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 48 | standard nonelectric | 43 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 49 | standard nonelectric | 62 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 5 | standard nonelectric | 39 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 50 | standard nonelectric | 57 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 51/52 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 53 | standard nonelectric | 59 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 54 | standard nonelectric | 61 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 55 | standard nonelectric | 67 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 56 | standard nonelectric | 65 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 57 | standard nonelectric | 72 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 58 | standard nonelectric | 51 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 59 | standard nonelectric | 63 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 6 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 60 | type not stated | |||
| Family Campground | 7 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | $30–$60 | |
| Family Campground | 8 | standard nonelectric | 69 ft | yes | $30–$60 |
| Family Campground | 9 | standard nonelectric | 37 ft | yes | $30–$60 |
| Group Campground | Group Site | group standard nonelectric | $200 |
25 of 57 listed
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions
Where it is
Cherry ValleyStanislaus National Forest · 4.9 mi
Dimond O CampgroundStanislaus National Forest · 5.0 miLumsden Bridge CampgroundStanislaus National Forest · 7.1 miLocated nine miles southeast of Highway 4 on Spicer Reservoir Road (7N01), a winding paved route where safe travel speeds average 20-30 mph.
The agency publishes this point for 4 campgrounds; it’s likely a district office, not the campground. Use the agency’s own page for directions.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Buck Meadows, CA
Typical weather
Typical October night 45°F, day 70°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 32°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
New Spicer Meadows is in California’s 5th congressional district. Its representative, Tom McClintock (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →