Trail River Cabin
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- Right now
- Taking bookingsSites offered on 30 of the next 30 nights read 15:34 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 1 notices
In the agency’s own words
Easily accessible cabin located in Trail River Campground. This cabin offers stunning views of Kenai Lake and the surrouding Kenai Mountains. A quick .1 mile hike to access in the summer time and a 1.2 mile ski or snowshoe in the winter. Please contact the Seward Ranger District at 907-288-3178 for current campground access road conditions. The Trail River Cabin is the perfect family friendly getaway and for those looking to get into the outdoors but not too far off the main road. The accessible log cabin has bunk space for six and a maximum occupancy of eight people. Keep reading
It is equipped with counter space, table, benches and a wood stove for heat. A splitting maul and hand saw are available. The closest outhouse is a vault toilet is located 400 feet away in the campground loop. There is no electricity, mattresses, bedding, cooking utensils or cut firewood at the cabin. Visitors should bring sleeping bags and pads, a cook stove, cooking gear and food. Potable water is available in the campground during the peak season but will need to be hauled in during the off season.
Recreation
Enjoy fishing for Dolly Varden and rainbow trout from the banks of Kenai Lake or the nearby Trail River. When the winds are calm, boating on Kenai Lake can be a fantastic way to enjoy your time at the Trail River Campground. Or explore many of the hiking trails that nearby Moose Pass has to offer. The Trail River Cabin provides beach access to Kenai Lake. Many people enjoy fishing, collecting driftwood, skipping rocks and walking along the beach. The view of the mountains surrounding Kenai Lake is gorgeous. Snow is present in the high peaks and avalanche chutes until the end of August. Trout fishing can be very productive from the beach at Trail River Campground as well as at many nearby streams. The lake is home to Dolly Varden, rainbow trout and lake trout. Although trout fishing is open year-round in Kenai Lake, special restrictions apply within 1/4 mile of inlet streams. Kenai Lake is not open to salmon fishing. Anglers are required to have a State of Alaska Fishing license and obey all regulations. Fishing equipment is not provided and permits are required to fish or hunt in the state, click here to learn more about Alaska Department of Fish & Game regulations. Within a one-mile radius of the campground entrance, are five trails: Falls Creek Trail, Crown Point Mine Road, Ptarmigan Creek Trail and Vagt Lake Trail. All of these trails run roughly east-west and provide access to the Iditarod National Historic Trail (INHT) which runs north-south. The INHT is an ongoing project to build a '"southern trek" connecting Seward (Mile 0 of the Iditarod Trail) to Eagle River (north of Anchorage). Currently, sections of this trail are still under construction, and several bridges are missing. However, links between Falls Creek Trail and Ptarmigan Lake Trail as well as between Vagt Lake Trail and Crown Point Mine Road make loop hikes possible. Click here for maps and recreation opportunity guides. The Falls Creek OHV Trail is a half mile north of the entrance road. This steep trail provides good views of Kenai and Lower Trail Lakes and is deal for hikers and experienced OHV enthusiasts. Click here for more i nformation about motorized vehicle use on the Chugach National Forest. A second option for motorized recreation is the Crown Point Mine Road. This trail is located one mile north of the campground entrance road at the end of Mine Road. This historic mining road leads above tree-line and provides great views. South of the entrance road is the Ptarmigan Creek Campground. This campground is also the location of Ptarmigan Creek Trail as well as a day use area with a fish-viewing platform where you can view spawning salmon in the late summer and fall. Ptarmigan Creek trail steadily gains elevation as it follows Ptarmigan Creek to Ptarmigan Lake. A round trip to the lake and back is seven miles. In the winter, the campground is closed and the campground's entrance road and loops are groomed for freestyle and Nordic skiing.
Facilities
The two-story log cabin has bunk space for seven and a maximum occupancy of eight people. It is equipped with counter space table, benches and a wood stove for heat. A splitting maul and hand saw are available. An vault toilet is located 400ft from the cabin in the campground loop. There is no electricity, mattresses, bedding, cooking utensils or cut firewood at the cabin. Visitors should bring sleeping bags and pads, a cook stove, cooking gear and food. Potable water is located in the campground and must be hauled to the cabin. Trash should be disposed of in the dumpsters located in the campground or the transfer station located at mile 24 of the Seward Highway. Potable water and trash disposal are only available when the campground is open during the summer season.
Natural Features
The Trail River Cabin is located on the edge of Kenai Lake nestled in woods of hemlock. cottonwood, sitka spruce, and aspen. The Chugach National Forest covers the eastern half of the Kenai Peninsula and extends around Prince William Sound. It covers over 5 million acres and is characterized by jagged mountains, deep fjords, glacier-fed rivers, and dense forests. This rich natural area supports many miles of productive fishing streams as well as wildlife populations. Brown bears and black bears are often spotted in the area. Click here to learn more about staying safe in bear country. Make your campsite less attractive to bears by practicing good Leave No Trace practices and learn more about outdoor safety and ethics .
Nearby Attractions
Trail River Cabin is located close to many tourist destinations. Within the Seward Ranger District, many world-class trailheads and day use areas await discovery. The newly-remodeled Seward Ranger District Information Office, is one mile south on Ranger Station Spur. There, friendly forest service employees can help you gather information, interpret the local ecology, purchase area maps, and offer advice about the Chugach National Forest. From this campground, possible day trips include wildlife viewing in Kenai Fjords National Park, rafting down the Kenai River, and a visit to Portage Glacier. Portage Glacier, is located in Portage Valley, a 14-mile isthmus that connects the Kenai Peninsula to mainland Alaska. Glacial remnants that can be seen today are Explorer, Middle, Byron, Burns and Shakespeare glaciers. Portage Valley is also home to the Begich Boggs Visitor Center, a world-class visitor center with a full-time interpretive staff and exhibits ready to inspire and explain the natural area.
What the agency tells you
The Trail River Campground is closed to motorized use during the winter months due to grooming of the road and loops for cross country skiing.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…are available. The closest outhouse is a vault toilet is located 400 feet away in the campground loop.…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…a cook stove, cooking gear and food. Potable water is available in the campground during the peak…”
- Firewood
- Sold here
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River, Creek, Beach
- Birding
- Boating
- Cross Country Skiing
- Fishing
- Kayaking
- Non-Motorized Boating
Full this Saturdayread 15:34 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBooked
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday, and on four midweek nights after it as well. read 15:34 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.
We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.
Every line of the receipt · 11
What you actually pay
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
recreation.gov availability, read 15:34 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
1 sites · the site map
All 1 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. 1 of the 1 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.
| Trail River | Trail River Cabin | cabin nonelectric | 172 ftKenai Lake | $75 |
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
Trail RiverChugach National Forest · 0.2 mi
Ptarmigan CreekChugach National Forest · 0.8 mi
Crescent Saddle CabinChugach National Forest · 4.8 miPrimrose CampgroundChugach National Forest · 5.0 mi
Crescent Lake CabinChugach National Forest · 7.9 mi
Lower Paradise Lake CabinChugach National Forest · 12 miFrom Anchorage, go south on Seward Highway approximately 100 miles to Crown Point. Turn at Milepost 24.2 on Trail River Road for 2 miles to campground. Take a right to the Eagle Point Loop and the cabin in located next to site 90. Look for Cabin Parking only spots and do not park in the campsite parking.
For winter time access. Park outside of the Trail River Campground gate. Do not drive on groomed cross country skiing trail. Approximately 1 mile cross country ski to access cabin.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Crown Point, AK
Typical weather
Typical October night 31°F, day 41°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 16°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
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Trail River Cabin is in Alaska’s at-large congressional district. Its representative, Nick Begich (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 moneyNicholas J. Begich IIIU.S. Representative · Alaska, at-large
- Your senator, on the same appropriationDan SullivanU.S. Senator · Alaska
- Your senator, on the same appropriationLisa MurkowskiU.S. Senator · Alaska
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 Trail River Cabin, Chugach National Forest, Alaska
Dear Nicholas J. Begich III, I’m a constituent in Alaska, at-large. I tried to camp at Trail River Cabin, Chugach National Forest, Alaska, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Trail River Cabin are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Trail River Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Trail River Cabin. 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 Trail River Cabin (Chugach National Forest, Alaska) 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 Trail River Cabin, Chugach National Forest, Alaska
Dear Dan Sullivan, I’m a constituent in Alaska. I tried to camp at Trail River Cabin, Chugach National Forest, Alaska, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Trail River Cabin are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Trail River Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Trail River Cabin. 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 Trail River Cabin (Chugach National Forest, Alaska) 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 Trail River Cabin, Chugach National Forest, Alaska
Dear Lisa Murkowski, I’m a constituent in Alaska. I tried to camp at Trail River Cabin, Chugach National Forest, Alaska, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Trail River Cabin are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Trail River Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Trail River Cabin. 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 Trail River Cabin (Chugach National Forest, Alaska) via campanac.com