Soquel Campground
2Heads up2 fires, nearest 11 mi
- Right now
- Closed for the seasonOut of the season the agency publishes
- A night
- $41From, per site
- Sites
- 2410 on recreation.gov
- Season
- May 1 – September 30Open May 1 through September 30
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 11 notices
In the agency’s own words
Soquel Campground consists of two loops on the banks of Willow Creek. The primitive sites are well-shaded by pine and fir trees and can accommodate small trailers and tents. Reservations for this campground are now site-specific. Keep reading
Recreation
Trails can be found off Highway 41 west of the campground, including the 3.7-mile Lewis Creek National Recreation Trail and the Miami Motorcycle Trails, a network of forest roads and trails for dirt bikes and off-road vehicles. The Shadow of the Giants, a grove of giant sequoias, is popular 1-mile hike just a short drive north of the campground.
Facilities
Each site has a dirt parking spur, picnic table, campfire ring and grill. Vault toilets are provided, but drinking water is not available. Campers must bring their own supply.
Natural Features
The Sierra National Forest, located on the western slope of the central Sierra Nevada, is known for its spectacular mountain scenery and abundant natural resources. The terrain includes rolling, oak-covered foothills, heavily forested middle elevation slopes and the starkly beautiful alpine landscape of the High Sierra. Soquel Campground is located in the Highway 41 Corridor of the Bass Lake Ranger District. This area is known for the Nelder Grove of giant sequoias.
Nearby Attractions
Yosemite National Park is a popular day trip from the area. The historic logging train at Yosemite Mountain Sugar Pine Railroad is a little closer to the campground. Soquel Campground is just off the Sierra Vista Scenic Byway (Sky Ranch Road), an 83-mile drive past many highlights of Sierra National Forest.
Charges & Cancellations
Once your reservation start date has begun, neither the Recreation.gov Contact Center nor the campground manager will be able to modify your reservation.
What the agency tells you
Maximum vehicle length is 20 feet
Bring your own drinking water
Be bear aware; keep all food out of site in approved containers or locked inside your vehicle and remove all food from area after eating; always keep a clean camp and do not feed any wild animals.
Everything else this campground posts · 8
No more than two pets per site and leashed at all times
Please Note: One RV with tow vehicle per single site or one vehicle per tent site. Most sites can accommodate 1 extra vehicle that is not included with the reservation fee. Extra vehicle will be charged a per night fee and collected at the campground.
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.
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.
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.
Click here for more information about Sierra National Forest
Reservations for this campground are now Site-Specific.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 24
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 30 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…picnic table, campfire ring and grill. Vault toilets are provided, but drinking water is not available.…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…grill. Vault toilets are provided, but drinking water is not available. Campers must bring their own supply. Natural…”
- Camp host
- On site
- recreation.gov lists “Host”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, Creek
- Hiking
- Night sky · 815th darkest of 1,201 in CA
- Bortle 3
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 10 of the 24 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 · 13
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $41 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.
“Once your reservation start date has begun, neither the Recreation.gov Contact Center nor the campground manager will be able to modify your reservation.” · 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
24 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 9 mapped sitesAll 24 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. 21 of the 24 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
Measured shade is NLCD Tree Canopy Cover 2024 (USDA Forest Service / MRLC) read at the site’s own coordinate, 27% canopy or more, and only for the sites the agency gave no Shade value. It never changes the agency’s own shaded count beside it.
| 1 | 1 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 10 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 2 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 3 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 4 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 5 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 6 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 7 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 8 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| 1 | 9 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $41 | ||
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 001 | standard nonelectric | 73 ft | 200 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 002 | standard nonelectric | 73 ft | 164 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 003 | standard nonelectric | 57 ft | 106 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 004 | standard nonelectric | 57 ft | 104 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 005 | standard nonelectric | $41 | |||
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 006 | standard nonelectric | $41 | |||
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 007 | standard nonelectric | 213 ft | 35 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 008 | standard nonelectric | 64 ft | 63 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 009 | standard nonelectric | 64 ft | 100 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 010 | standard nonelectric | 76 ft | 166 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | 011 | standard nonelectric | 111 ft | 230 ft | $41 | |
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | FS1-20 | type not stated | 20 ft | |||
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | FS1-20N | type not stated | 20 ft | |||
| AREA SOQUEL CAMPGROUND | FS1-30 | type not stated | 30 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
Texas FlatsSierra National Forest · 1.6 miNelder Grove CampgroundSierra National Forest · 1.9 mi
Kelty MeadowSierra National Forest · 2.5 mi
ChilkootSierra National Forest · 3.1 miFresno Dome CampgroundSierra National Forest · 3.4 miFrom Fresno, take Highway 41 north through town of Oakhurst. Take the Sky Ranch Road (Road 632) east for 7 miles, turn southeast on Forest Road 6S40, and travel 1 mile to Soquel Campground.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Oakhurst, CA
Typical weather
Typical May night 37°F, day 63°F.
Coldest night of the open season: typical May night 37°F. Bring the bag rated for it.
Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or moreOutside the published season
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
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
Soquel Campground 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 →