Porcupine Springs
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $10–$14Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 97 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 4 notices
In the agency’s own words
Porcupine Springs Campground is located along the scenic Rock Creek Road, in southern Idaho. It sits at an elevation of 6,950 feet. Visitors enjoy the area for its abundance of trails and scenic beauty. Keep reading
Recreation
Numerous hiking, biking, horseback riding and off-road vehicle trails begin within or near the campground, including Porcupine Springs, Ross Falls, Rim View, Pike Mountain and Third Fork trails. Fishing is popular on Rock Creek.
Facilities
This large campground contains three group sites that each accommodate up to 50 and 100 people. The recently updated sites are accessible and equipped with picnic tables, grills, serving and utility tables and campfire circles. The group site on Loop C has large corrals for horses. Several single-family campsites are available as well. Each is equipped with a picnic table, campfire ring, grill and a utility table. Additional sites not listed for reservation are available on a first-come, first-served basis. Accessible vault toilets and drinking water are provided. A campground host is located on-site. Roads and parking spurs within the campground are gravel.
Natural Features
The campground is situated in a scenic forest of pine and aspen trees. Summer wildflowers are vivid and abundant, and wildlife frequents the area.
What the agency tells you
Idaho OHV Safety Message
Click here for more information on the Sawtooth National Forest
Don't Move Firewood: Help prevent the spread of tree-killing pests in our national forests by obtaining firewood near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org.
Everything else this campground posts · 1
Due to a new well installation for the Rock Creek water system, there will be no water available until August 31th, 2019. Please plan accordingly and bring all the water you will need for your stay. For more information, please contact the Minidoka Ranger District at 208-678-0430.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 9 · 3 group
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 30 ft
- Accessible sites
- 4
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…first-served basis. Accessible vault toilets and drinking water are provided. A campground host…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…basis. Accessible vault toilets and drinking water are provided. A campground host is located on-site.…”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Creek
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 384th darkest of 523 in ID
- Bortle 2
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 7 of the 9 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 · 14
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $10–$14 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
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
9 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 7 mapped sitesAll 9 sites
Toilet distances are OpenStreetMap’s, measured for 7 of the 9 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. 9 of the 9 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| LOOA | LOPA | group standard nonelectric | 30 ft | yes | 404 ft | 997 ftLittle Fork Third Fork Rock Creek | 873 ft | $75 |
| LOOB | LOPB | group standard nonelectric | 30 ft | yes | 260 ft | 1,105 ftLittle Fork Third Fork Rock Creek | 602 ft | $75 |
| LOOC | LOPC | group standard nonelectric | 30 ft | yes | 454 ft | 1,029 ftLittle Fork Third Fork Rock Creek | 837 ft | $75 |
| LOOP D | 15 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 101 ft | 1,365 ftLittle Fork Third Fork Rock Creek | 345 ft | $10–$14 | |
| LOOP D | 16 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 101 ft | 1,401 ftLittle Fork Third Fork Rock Creek | 307 ft | $10–$14 | |
| LOOP D | 17 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | yes | 132 ft | 1,568 ftLittle Fork Third Fork Rock Creek | 137 ft | $10–$14 |
| LOOP D | 18 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 122 ft | 1,504 ftLittle Fork Third Fork Rock Creek | 231 ft | $10–$14 | |
| S&P | Double S&P | type not stated | 30 ft | $10–$14 | ||||
| S&P | Single S&P | type not stated | 30 ft | $10–$14 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions
Where it is
Lower PenstemonSawtooth National Forest · 2.2 miUpper Penstemon CampgroundSawtooth National Forest · 2.2 miFather and Sons CampgroundSawtooth National Forest · 3.9 miBostetter CampgroundSawtooth National Forest · 4.7 miFrom Hansen, Idaho, travel south on County Road G3 for approximately 31 miles. The road becomes Forest Road 515. Continue on FR 515 as it becomes gravel and turns into Forest Road 500. The Porcupine Springs Campground sign will be on the left.
The weather
the next four days
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Oakley, ID
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
Porcupine Springs is in Idaho’s 2nd congressional district. Its representative, Mike Simpson (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →