Stephens Park
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 15:22 UTC
- A night
- $30From, per site
- Sites
- 9All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 4 notices
In the agency’s own words
Located just below Blakely Mountain Dam along the shoreline Lake Hamilton is Stephens Park. This small quiet campground has great shoreline fishing access in the Stephens Park and Avery Day-use Area. There is also boat ramp access nearby for Lake Ouachita by using the Spillway Ramp and access to Lake Hamilton using the Avery Ramp. In the area is Wood Duck Slough trail and the east end of the LOViT (Lake Ouachita Vista Trail). The LOViT is a 44 mile long trail system that meanders along the south end of Lake Ouachita. Click here for the Lake Ouachita Virtual Tour. Keep reading
Recreation
Water skiers, jet skiers and anglers can all enjoy the crystal clear waters of the lake, while hikers enjoy the campground's location on the Lake Ouachita Vista Trail (LOViT), which meanders across the south end of the lake. Wildlife enthusiasts can find everything from bobcats to black bears and deer in the forested mountains surrounding the lake, and Bald eagles are often spotted in winter.
Facilities
The campground has 9 large class A sites with sewer, water, and 50 amp hookups. Other amenities include shower house and playground.
Natural Features
Lake Ouachita is nestled in the Ouachita Mountains just 10 miles west of Hot Springs National Park. The pool is fed by the cool waters of the Ouachita River and extends about 30 miles over 40,000 surface acres. Contact Info This location is unstaffed. To speak with our main office for general information, please call: (501) 767-2101.
Nearby Attractions
Head to Hot Springs National Park and discover how it earned the nickname, "The American Spa." Or take a scenic drive through the 1.8 million-acres of Ouachita National Forest.
What the agency tells you
No off-road vehicles allowed in park
Don't Move Firewood: Protect your forests from tree-killing pests by buying your firewood locally and burning it on-site. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.
Check-Out time is 4pm and Check-In time is 6pm
Everything else this campground posts · 1
Camper Self-Check In Cards are located at the entrance of the campground. Please grab a card apon entry, fill it out and attach it to your campsite post. A ranger will verify the information written on the card later and check you in.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 9
- Hookups
- 9 electric, 9 water, 9 sewer
- Longest rig
- 20 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- FLUSH TOILETS on 1 of 10 campsite records, ACCESSIBLE FLUSH TOILETS on 1 of 10 campsite records
- Showers
- Yes, the record doesn’t say what kind
- SHOWERS on 1 of 10 campsite records
- Drinking water
- Yes
- DRINKING WATER on 1 of 10 campsite records, DRINKING WATER (PEAK SEASON) on 1 of 10 campsite records, ACCESSIBLE DRINKING WATER on 1 of 10 campsite records, WATER SPIGOT on 1 of 10 campsite records
- Boat ramp
- Yes
- Playground
- Yes
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Hot springs, Lake, River, Beach
- Night sky · 139th darkest of 158 in AR
- Bortle 4
Full this Saturdayread 15:22 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
9 campgrounds have sites open within 30 miles, read 16:20 UTC. See them
OpenBooked
Every one of the 9 sites on offer is taken this Friday and Saturday. 3 are free on Mon, Oct 19. read 15:22 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 · 14
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $30 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 · 9
Sites the agency is offering this Friday and Saturday that nobody has taken, nearest first; the nearest 5 of 9. read 16:20 UTC
- Charlton Recreation AreaOuachita National Forest · 12 mi · 46 of 94 site-nights open
- Arlie MooreDegray Lake · 21 mi · 14 of 92 site-nights open
- Point CedarDegray Lake · 21 mi · 26 of 82 site-nights open
- Alpine RidgeDegray Lake · 22 mi · 4 of 58 site-nights open
- Iron MountainDegray Lake · 24 mi · 6 of 60 site-nights open
recreation.gov availability, read 15:22 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
10 records
All 10 records
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 10 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| A | 1 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 2 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 3 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 4 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 5 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 6 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 7 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 8 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| A | 9 | rv electric | 20 ft | 50/30/20 amp | $30 | |
| PAV 1 | day use | 20 ft | 20 amp | yes |
The agency files 1 more record here that isn’t a site for the night. It files it as day use. It’s in the table above, marked for what it is, and it isn’t counted as a site.
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Avery0.2 mi
Spillway (Lake Ouachita)1.4 mi
Brady Mountain4.4 mi
Gulpha Gorge CampgroundHot Springs National Park · 9.4 mi
Crystal Springs (AR)9.6 mi
Charlton Recreation AreaOuachita National Forest · 12 miFrom Hot Springs, AR: Take US 270 west to AR-227 N/Mountain Pine Rd for 6 miles. Continue straight on Blakely Dam road through Mountain Pine and past Mountain Pine school. Stephens Park Campground will be on your left just before you get to the base of Blakely Mountain Dam.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Mountain Pine, AR
Typical weather
Typical October night 48°F, day 73°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 29°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 Augusts are colder than the August 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
Stephens Park is in Arkansas’s 4th congressional district. Its representative, Bruce Westerman (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 moneyBruce WestermanU.S. Representative · Arkansas’s 4th district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJohn BoozmanU.S. Senator · Arkansas
- Your senator, on the same appropriationTom CottonU.S. Senator · Arkansas
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 Stephens Park, Arkansas
Dear Bruce Westerman, I’m a constituent in Arkansas’s 4th district. I tried to camp at Stephens Park, Arkansas, and couldn’t. All 9 sites at Stephens Park are reservable, 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. Stephens Park keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Stephens Park. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 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 Stephens Park (Arkansas) 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 Stephens Park, Arkansas
Dear John Boozman, I’m a constituent in Arkansas. I tried to camp at Stephens Park, Arkansas, and couldn’t. All 9 sites at Stephens Park are reservable, 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. Stephens Park keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Stephens Park. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 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 Stephens Park (Arkansas) 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 Stephens Park, Arkansas
Dear Tom Cotton, I’m a constituent in Arkansas. I tried to camp at Stephens Park, Arkansas, and couldn’t. All 9 sites at Stephens Park are reservable, 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. Stephens Park keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Stephens Park. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 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 Stephens Park (Arkansas) via campanac.com