Raccoon Branch Campground
We don’t think it should be. Every campground should hold some sites for whoever drives up.Tell your representative →
- Right now
- Taking bookingsSites offered on 30 of the next 30 nights read 16:44 UTC
- A night
- $20–$27Across the site types the agency prices
- Sites
- 2017 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 5 notices
In the agency’s own words
Raccoon Branch Campground, nestled at the base of Dickey Knob, offers scenic mountain views, hiking trail access from campsites and cool mountain streams. Campers can access Dickey Creek and the Raccoon Branch from the campground. The most notable time to visit is fall, when the trees boast gorgeous fall foliage. With a location just 11 miles from Interstate 81, the beautiful campground is easily reached by drivers heading out from one of the surrounding cities. Keep reading
Recreation
The beautiful Dickey Knob Trail takes hikers through a Wilderness to the top of Dickey Knob for spectacular views of Sugar Grove and Rye Valley. The creek provides a setting for wading and fishing.
Facilities
Every site accommodates RV or tent camping and five campsites have electric hookups. Perks of the campground include flush toilets, drinking water, paved roads and spurs and a dump station. There are no showers. A volunteer host is onsite to welcome visitors and offer advice on the region.
Natural Features
The campground is at an elevation of 2,880 ft., along a large grassy area, surrounded by pines, hardwoods and rhododendrons. Perched in the Appalachian Mountains, Raccoon Branch is part of the Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, a 200,000-acre stretch of designated wilderness areas.
Nearby Attractions
Hike the Appalachian Trail, which extends more than 2,175 miles throughout the Appalachian Mountains across 14 states. The trail was designated as the first National Scenic Trail. The Virginia Creeper Trail, Hungry Mother State Park and Grayson Highlands State Park are nearby.
What the agency tells you
Check-in is at 2pm and check-out is at 12pm.
Rates do not reflect discounts and attribute fees such as electrical and water hookups
No cell phone coverage
Everything else this campground posts · 2
For more information on George Washington and Jefferson National Forests, click here
Don't Move Firewood: Help protect our forests! Prevent the spread of tree-killing pests by obtaining firewood at or near your destination and burning it on-site. Moving firewood is illegal in some states. Visit dontmovefirewood.org to learn more.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 20
- Hookups
- 5 electric, 8 water
- Longest rig
- 60 ft
- Paved pads
- All
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- FLUSH TOILETS on 20 of 20 campsite records
- Showers
- None at this campground
- “There are no showers.”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- DRINKING WATER on 20 of 20 campsite records
- Dump station
- Yes
Around the campground
- On the water
- Creek
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 27th darkest of 88 in VA
- Bortle 4
Full this Saturdayread 16:44 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
1 campground has sites open within 30 miles, read 16:29 UTC. See them
OpenBooked
Every one of the 9 sites on offer is taken this Friday and Saturday. 6 are free on Tue, Oct 20. read 16:44 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 · 13
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rates for this season, $20–$27 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
Open within 30 miles this weekend · 1
Sites the agency is offering this Friday and Saturday that nobody has taken, nearest first. read 16:29 UTC
- Doughton Park CampgroundBlue Ridge Parkway · 27 mi · 1 of 60 site-nights open
recreation.gov availability, read 16:44 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
20 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 17 mapped sitesAll 20 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. 17 of the 20 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| RABC | 001 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | 46 ft | 131 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 002 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | 46 ft | 157 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 003 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 47 ft | 171 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 004 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 71 ft | 103 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 005 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | 77 ft | 153 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 006 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | 81 ft | 52 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 007 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 77 ft | 142 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 008 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 81 ft | 47 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 009 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 144 ft | 150 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 010 | standard electric | 35 ft | 30 amp | 57 ft | 204 ftHutton Branch | $27 |
| RABC | 011 | standard electric | 60 ft | 30 amp | 57 ft | 261 ftHutton Branch | $27 |
| RABC | 012 | type not stated | 25 ft | 30 amp | 254 ft | ||
| RABC | 013 | standard electric | 35 ft | 30 amp | 61 ft | 321 ftHutton Branch | $27 |
| RABC | 014 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 89 ft | 284 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 015 | standard electric | 50 ft | 30 amp | 69 ft | 373 ft | $27 |
| RABC | 016 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | 50 ft | 254 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 017 | standard electric | 40 ft | 30 amp | 69 ft | 327 ft | $27 |
| RABC | 018 | type not stated | 40 ft | 30 amp | 295 ft | ||
| RABC | 019 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 50 ft | 211 ft | $20 | |
| RABC | 020 | type not stated | 40 ft | 30 amp | 239 ft |
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
Hurricane CampgroundMount Rogers National Recreation Area · 3.9 mi
Old Virginia Group Horse CampMount Rogers National Recreation Area · 5.0 mi
Fox Creek Horse CampMount Rogers National Recreation Area · 5.6 mi
GrindstoneMount Rogers National Recreation Area · 7.7 mi
Blue Springs Gap CabinJefferson National Forest · 8.6 mi
Comer's Rock Recreation AreaMount Rogers National Recreation Area · 11 miFrom I-81, take Marion exit 45 onto Virginia State Route 16 South. Follow SR 16 South for approximately 13 miles to the campground on the right.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Sugar Grove, VA
Typical weather
Typical October night 39°F, day 66°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 22°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 · a letter you can send
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
Raccoon Branch Campground is in Virginia’s 9th congressional district. Its representative, H. Morgan Griffith (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 moneyH. Morgan GriffithU.S. Representative · Virginia’s 9th district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationMark R. WarnerU.S. Senator · Virginia
- Your senator, on the same appropriationTim KaineU.S. Senator · Virginia
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 Raccoon Branch Campground, Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia
Dear H. Morgan Griffith, I’m a constituent in Virginia’s 9th district. I tried to camp at Raccoon Branch Campground, Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia, and couldn’t. recreation.gov lists 17 of the 20 campsites the agency files at Raccoon Branch Campground, and every one of them is booked ahead, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, all 9 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. Raccoon Branch Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Raccoon Branch 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 Raccoon Branch Campground (Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia) 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 Raccoon Branch Campground, Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia
Dear Mark R. Warner, I’m a constituent in Virginia. I tried to camp at Raccoon Branch Campground, Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia, and couldn’t. recreation.gov lists 17 of the 20 campsites the agency files at Raccoon Branch Campground, and every one of them is booked ahead, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, all 9 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. Raccoon Branch Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Raccoon Branch 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 Raccoon Branch Campground (Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia) 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 Raccoon Branch Campground, Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia
Dear Tim Kaine, I’m a constituent in Virginia. I tried to camp at Raccoon Branch Campground, Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia, and couldn’t. recreation.gov lists 17 of the 20 campsites the agency files at Raccoon Branch Campground, and every one of them is booked ahead, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, all 9 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. Raccoon Branch Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Raccoon Branch 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 Raccoon Branch Campground (Mount Rogers National Recreation Area, Virginia) via campanac.com