CAMPANAC.Powered by public lands intelligenceMore Than Just Parks
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National Park Service · Olympic National Park · WA

South Beach Campground

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Caution
Staircase Developed Area is Open, Use Caution in Burned Areas The Staircase developed area is open. The surrounding wilderness areas will remain closed as repair and recovery efforts continue. Use extreme caution when entering burned areas. Burned landscapes may contain falling trees and branches…
Danger
Bat Tests Positive for Rabies, Visitors Urged to Report Potential Contact A rabid bat was found at Olympic National Park near Staircase Bridge on August 9th. At approximately 2 p.m., the bat swooped down onto an unidentified woman and was temporarily caught in her hair. This individual is at risk for rabies and…
Alerts: National Park Service alerts API · Oct 18, 2026
First come, first servedNo reservation, and none to be had: all 55 sites go to whoever pulls in first.

This is how it should work.

Get directionsWhat it costs, and the rules
Right now
Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
A night
$15From, per site
Sites
5555 of them walk-up
40 ftElevation
680 ftWater · an unnamed streamOcean · 91 ft
25.2 miS of Forks, WA
55Walk-up sites
n/aTree cover · water-masked cell

The place

the agency’s own description · what’s there

In the agency’s own words

Positioned on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean, South Beach offers panoramic ocean views and beach access.

Source: National Park Service API · Aug 24, 2026

Facilities

Toilets
Vault Toilets - seasonal
Drinking water
None, bring your own
Source: National Park Service and agency records

Around the campground

On the water
Beach, Coast
Night sky · 32nd darkest of 400 in WA
Bortle 2
Source: Stated in the agency description
Night sky: VIIRS Day/Night Band annual cloud-free composite, VNL V2 2024 (Earth Observation Group, Colorado School of Mines), read at the published coordinate · Sep 8, 2026

Nothing to book, just show up

One of 1,623 federal campgrounds where the site still goes to whoever pulls in first, and a night costs $15 with nothing added. Get there before noon on a summer weekend.

recreation.gov publishes no availability for a campground you can’t reserve, so there’s no thirty-night reading to draw here. The season bar above is what the agency does publish.

BookingNo reservationsNothing to book, and no release date to wait forthe agency’s record
A night$15Per site, fromthe agency’s fee record
A weekend$30DerivedFriday and Saturday, everything includedours, from the lines above
Runs itNational Park Servicethe agency’s record
Directions
Every line of the receipt · 5

What you actually pay

The sign priceNational Park Service
A night, from$15
South Beach Campground Fee$15
The booking feerecreation.gov
Nothing. This campground takes no bookings, so there’s no reservation fee to pay.
What a stay costs
One night, fromDerived$15
A weekend, Friday and Saturday, fromDerived$30

Derived by CAMPANAC: the lowest per-night amount the agency’s fee record states ($15), and no booking fee, because this campground takes no reservations. A weekend here means Friday and Saturday night. Optional charges (an extra vehicle, a second tent, a dump-station fee) are listed separately and aren’t in this total.

How we know this receipt · 5
Sign price: Derived by CAMPANAC from the National Park Service fee record: a stated per-night amount only · Sep 7, 2026
Booking fee, change fee, cancellation fee, no-show: Rules and Reservation Policies, Recreation.gov, the published fee schedule, curated by hand into lib/reservation-fee-schedule.json (9 rows, each carrying its own verbatim sentence). The publisher states these policies were last updated September 2019. · Sep 9, 2026
The two totals: Derived by CAMPANAC by adding the agency’s own published nightly rate to recreation.gov’s own published reservation fee. Both components are cited above; the addition is ours and is shown only where every component is known. · Sep 9, 2026
Who keeps the booking fee: Recreation.gov facility policy text, Dead Swede Campground (facility 234221) · Not on the national policy page. This is agency policy text recreation.gov publishes on individual campground pages; this site holds it verbatim on 45 active campgrounds (campground_rules.cancellation_description, scripts/load-facility-rules.mjs). · Sep 9, 2026
The contract: Reservation Gods: Who Stole Our Campsites and Sold Them Back to Us, More Than Just Parks, April 2025 · Apr 1, 2025
Source: National Park Service API · Aug 24, 2026

record Aug 24, 2026 · How we know all this

Seen something wrong here? Tell us.

Getting there

the map and the coordinate
Coordinate47.56602, -124.36139

Where it is

Source: National Park Service API · Aug 24, 2026

The weather

the next four days · the thirty-year normal

Next four days, and the thirty-year normal

Forecast

Overnight46°Clear
Sunday54°Mostly Sunny
Sunday Night47°Mostly Cloudy1% rain
Monday53°Partly Sunny

NWS forecast for Queets, WA

Source: National Weather Service, SEW forecast office · Oct 18, 2026

Typical weather

Typical October night 42°F, day 61°F.

Coldest month of the year: typical February night 34°F. Bring the bag rated for it.

80°30°

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 Augusts are colder than the August line. The seven-day forecast above answers the other question.

Measured at: CLEARWATER, WA (USC00451496), 3 miles away and 40 ft higher
Source: NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, U.S. Climate Normals 1991-2020, monthly normals · Sep 8, 2026

The land, and who answers for it

who answers for it

Who answers for this land

Emily Randall, official portrait

South Beach Campground is in Washington’s 6th congressional district. Its representative, Emily Randall (D), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: A. See every public-lands vote →

Seen something wrong here? Tell us.

Source: U.S. Census district boundaries and the MTJP Congressional Public Lands Score

How we know

every fact on this page, and where it came from
Right now: National Park Service publishes no season and no closure for this campground, and it takes no bookings we can read. That’s a gap in the record and not a locked gate.
Elevation: USGS 3DEP elevation point query at this campground’s coordinate · Sep 7, 2026
Night sky: VIIRS Day/Night Band annual cloud-free composite, VNL V2 2024 (Earth Observation Group, Colorado School of Mines), read at the published coordinate: 0.04 mcd/m² of artificial all-sky glow, ranked against the 400 rated federal campgrounds in Washington · Sep 8, 2026
Sky-glow model: Duriscoe, Anderson, Luginbuhl and Baugh (2018), a simplified model of all-sky artificial sky glow derived from VIIRS Day/Night band data, the National Park Service sky-glow model
Cell signal: the Park Service’s own campground description, read as text by CAMPANAC. None of this is a measurement. It’s what the land manager published about the place, and phones, carriers and weather all disagree with each other; treat it as a warning, not a promise.
Nearest place of any size: Queets, WA, 2.1 mi NNW (a census designated place). Straight line.
Nearest town: U.S. Census Bureau TIGER/Line 2024 places, measured by CAMPANAC to the town boundary; population is the ACS 2020-2024 5-year estimate · Sep 9, 2026