River Side (ID - Boise)
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $12From, per site
- Sites
- 8All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 7 notices
In the agency’s own words
River Side Campground is located along the Deadwood River at the north end of scenic Deadwood Reservoir at an elevation of 5,300 feet. Boating, fishing and hiking are popular activities. Keep reading
Recreation
Because of its remote location, Deadwood Reservoir is quiet and unpopulated, making for great fishing for Chinook and Kokanee salmon, and rainbow and cutthroat trout. Boating, water skiing, canoeing and kayaking are popular on the lake. A boat ramp is located about 2 miles away at Cozy Cove Campground. Many trails for hiking, mountain biking, horseback and off-road vehicle riding are in the area.
Facilities
This primitive campground offers waterfront sites with direct river access. A vault toilet is located up a hill above the campground. Drinking water is provided. Roads and parking spurs within the site are dirt.
Natural Features
The campground is situated in a mixed-growth pine forest, which offers plentiful shade. Summer wildflowers are abundant. The entire campground affords views of the river.
What the agency tells you
Idaho OHV Safety Message
Additional vehicles may be subject to parking fees
Some first-come, first-served sites may be available
Everything else this campground posts · 4
Electric hookups are not available
Please contact the Lowman Ranger District at 208-259-3361 for off-season camping information
Click here for more information on the Boise 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.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 8
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 100 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…sites with direct river access. A vault toilet is located up a hill above the campground. Drinking…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…located up a hill above the campground. Drinking water is provided. Roads and parking spurs within the…”
- Boat ramp
- Yes
Around the campground
- On the water
- Reservoir, Lake, River
- Boating
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Water sports
- Night sky · 248th darkest of 523 in ID
- Bortle 2
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 · 13
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $12 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
8 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 8 mapped sitesAll 8 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. 8 of the 8 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 001 | standard nonelectric | 100 ft | 70 ft | 34 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 |
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 002 | standard nonelectric | 70 ft | 83 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 | |
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 003 | standard nonelectric | 75 ft | 52 ft | 59 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 |
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 004 | standard nonelectric | 100 ft | 52 ft | 110 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 |
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 005 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | 110 ft | 73 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 |
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 006 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | 75 ft | 31 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 |
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 007 | standard nonelectric | 100 ft | 75 ft | 106 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 |
| RIVER SIDE (BOISE) | 008 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | 136 ft | 117 ftDeadwood Reservoir | $12 |
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
Where it is
Riverside Campground (Lowman)Boise National Forest · 0.5 mi
Barneys Campground (Boise National Forest, ID)Boise National Forest · 1.1 mi
Barney's CampgroundBoise National Forest · 1.6 mi
HowersBoise National Forest · 1.8 mi
Cozy CoveBoise National Forest · 3.9 mi
Peace Valley CampgroundBoise National Forest · 5.9 miFrom Boise, Idaho, take State Highway 55 north. At Banks, take Highway 17/Banks-Lowman Highway east to Lowman. Turn left on Highway 21. Continue along Highway 17 over Banner Summit. Turn west on Forest Road 579. Continue on FR 579 to Deadwood Resevoir.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Lowman, ID
Typical weather
Typical October night 31°F, day 58°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 15°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
River Side (ID - Boise) is in Idaho’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Russ Fulcher (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →