Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area
This place has sites and nobody may sleep in them.Ask for camping here →
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 12 notices
In the agency’s own words
Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area is a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers day use facility offering many outdoor recreation opportunities everyone can enjoy. The park is located in Keene and Roxbury, New Hampshire. Keep reading
Recreation
Picnicking, canoeing, hiking, wildlife viewing and fishing are just a few of the summertime favorite activities enjoyed at Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area. If sports are your idea of fun, there are plenty of large areas for volleyball, baseball and other team sports. There is also a disc golf course in the park. If you are planning a family reunion, company party, wedding reception or any group function, the shelters at Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area are a great place to hold your event.
Facilities
Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area has a restroom with flush toilets, picnic tables, grills and three shelters that are reservable. The largest shelter, the Pine, accommodates up to 80 people. It has electricity and is located along the gravel road near the river. The medium size shelter, the Elm, accommodates up to 60 people. It also has electricity. It is located on the entrance road, and is the closest shelter to the restroom. The Alder shelter, is the smallest shelter, it can accommodate up to 16 people and does not have electricity.
Natural Features
Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area offers an open lake front, open grassy areas as well as shady sites along the river.
Nearby Attractions
Surry Mountain Lake Beach is approximately 10 miles from Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area and offers a beach, boat launch, picnic shelters, picnic tables, grills, restrooms and a playground. Picnic shelters can be reserved at Surry Mountain Lake Recreation.gov Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (603) 352-4130.
Charges & Cancellations
If a customer cancels a group day use facility reservation within the 14 days of scheduled arrival date they will forfeit the total fee. A $10.00 service fee will apply if you change or cancel your reservation outside of the 14 day scheduled arrival. The $10.00 service fee will be deducted from the refund amount.
What the agency tells you
Otter Brook Recreation Area will be open from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. for the 2026 season.
Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area no longer offers a beach. The beach is permanently closed and water quality will not be tested. Visitors utilizing the lake for water based activities shall do so at their own risk. Visitors wishing to reserve shelters with a beach area should reserve at Surry Mountain Lake in Surry, New Hampshire at Surry Mountain Lake Recreation.gov
Otter Brook Lake is a day-use area. NO OVERNIGHT CAMPING
Everything else this campground posts · 9
Carry in, carry out trash.
There are no life guards; it is a swim at your own risk facility.
Motorboats are allowed (no wake).
Otter Brook is a flood control facility and the park may be flooded during severe storm events.
Don't Move Firewood: Protect your forests from tree-killing pests by buying your firewood locally and burning it on-site. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.
Pets are allowed on a leash in the recreation area.
No commercial activities, sales or solicitation of business on USACE land.
Shelter reservations and or group events that bring in hired food trucks or vendors, large event tents (greater than 12’x12’), bounce houses, and any other atypical items are required to apply for a special use permit by calling the main office at 603-352-4130. Please inquire if you are unsure.
For more information call the Otter Brook Lake project office at (603) 352-4130.
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- “…Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area has a restroom with flush toilets, picnic tables, grills and three shelters that are…”
- Boat ramp
- Yes
- Playground
- Yes
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River, Beach
- Birding
- Boating
- Canoeing
- Cross Country Skiing
- Disc Golf
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Hunting
- Kayaking
- Picnicking
- Snowshoeing
- Water access
- Wildlife viewing
Nothing here to sleep in
The agency files 3 records here and marks every one of them day use, not overnight. On its own record there’s nothing here to spend the night in.
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 · 12
What you actually pay
“A $10.00 service fee will apply if you change or cancel your reservation outside of the 14 day scheduled arrival. The $10.00 service fee will be deducted from the refund amount.” · this campground’s own 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 · 6
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
3 records · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 3 mapped sitesAll 3 records
| OTTER BROOK LAKE BEACH | Alder | day use | 286 ft | 346 ft | $30 | |
| OTTER BROOK LAKE BEACH | Elm | day use | yes | 286 ft | 273 ft | $65–$85 |
| OTTER BROOK LAKE BEACH | Pine | day use | yes | 323 ft | 96 ft | $65–$85 |
The agency files 3 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
Surry Mountain Lake Beach5.3 mi
Tully Lake Recreation Area (MA)22 mi
Townshend Lake Recreation Area25 mi
Elm Brook Park Rec Area30 mi
Stoughton Pond Rec Area32 miOtter Brook Lake Beach is located off of Route 9 East in Keene, NH.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Keene, NH
Typical weather
Typical October night 36°F, day 60°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 10°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
who answers for it · a letter you can send
Who answers for this land
Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area is in New Hampshire’s 2nd congressional district. Its representative, Maggie Goodlander (D), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: A+. See every public-lands vote →
Who can change it · 3
The agency’s own record files sites here and marks every one of them day use. The draft asks whether any could open to overnight camping, and if not, why.
- The member who votes the moneyMaggie GoodlanderU.S. Representative · New Hampshire’s 2nd district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJeanne ShaheenU.S. Senator · New Hampshire
- Your senator, on the same appropriationMargaret Wood HassanU.S. Senator · New Hampshire
Read the draft, or change the wording
Asks them to put the same question to the agency in writing.
Subject Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area has sites, and nobody may sleep in them
Dear Maggie Goodlander, I’m a constituent in New Hampshire’s 2nd district. Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area, New Hampshire carries 3 records on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’s own file, every one of them marked day use rather than overnight. I’m asking you to put one question to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in writing: would they consider opening any of these sites to overnight camping, and if not, why not? Road trips and camping on public land are part of how this country knows itself. It’s where a lot of people meet the place they live in for the first time, and it has never been something you had to be well off, or well organised six months in advance, to do. Sent about Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area (New Hampshire) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the same question to the agency in writing.
Subject Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area has sites, and nobody may sleep in them
Dear Jeanne Shaheen, I’m a constituent in New Hampshire. Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area, New Hampshire carries 3 records on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’s own file, every one of them marked day use rather than overnight. I’m asking you to put one question to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in writing: would they consider opening any of these sites to overnight camping, and if not, why not? Road trips and camping on public land are part of how this country knows itself. It’s where a lot of people meet the place they live in for the first time, and it has never been something you had to be well off, or well organised six months in advance, to do. Sent about Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area (New Hampshire) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the same question to the agency in writing.
Subject Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area has sites, and nobody may sleep in them
Dear Margaret Wood Hassan, I’m a constituent in New Hampshire. Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area, New Hampshire carries 3 records on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’s own file, every one of them marked day use rather than overnight. I’m asking you to put one question to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in writing: would they consider opening any of these sites to overnight camping, and if not, why not? Road trips and camping on public land are part of how this country knows itself. It’s where a lot of people meet the place they live in for the first time, and it has never been something you had to be well off, or well organised six months in advance, to do. Sent about Otter Brook Lake Recreation Area (New Hampshire) via campanac.com