Turtle Rock Campground
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 29 of the next 30 nights read 15:52 UTC
- A night
- $20From, per site
- Sites
- 24All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 9 notices
In the agency’s own words
Turtle Rock Campground, located at an elevation of 8290 feet, is 3.5 miles north of Buena Vista, Colorado. Campers appreciate the area for its recreation opportunities within Fourmile Recreation Area and the Arkansas Headwater Recreation Area. Turtle Rock Campground is open from March 1st until November 30th. Situated within a pinion juniper woodland setting, 24 small campsites sit at the base of Turtle Rock Granite Formation. Large RVs and travel trailers over 35 feet are not recommended. Keep reading
Recreation
Turtle Rock Campground offers easy access to the namesake rock formation, which is beloved by rock climbers. Various route difficulties can be found on Turtle Rock as well as other smaller granite formations in the area. Hiking, mountain biking and OHV riding are recreation activities accessed from the campground.
Facilities
The campsites at Turtle Rock Campground are small, RVs and Trailers longer than 35 feet aren't recommended. This 24-site campground including 1 Group Site, and 1 double vault toilet. Individual sites are limited to 2 vehicles and 8 people. Group site is limited to 4 vehicles and 20 people. Each campsite includes a parking space, a metal fire ring and a picnic table. Most sites are designed for tent or van camping. Large camp trailers and RVs under 35 feet can access the campground are accommodated with some pull-through sites. Campsites 1, 2, 3, 4, 22, 23, and 24 are First Come, First Serve, pay for the site at the pay station immediately after occupying the site. There is no guarantee that these sites will be available when you arrive. Campsites 5-21 are Reservable 3 Months in advance, if there isn't a current reservation on the day of, sites are available on a First Come, First Serve basis payable at the Pay Station for one night only. Campsites 7-12 are Tent Only, campsites 14 and 20 are Pull-Throughs, Sites 4, 5, 14, 19, 20 and 21 are large enough for RV’s and Trailers up to 35’. Drinking water, electric hook-ups and trash service are not available at Turtle Rock Campground so please bring your own water and plan to take your trash with you when you leave. Bring your own firewood.
Natural Features
The Collegiate Peaks Mountains form dramatic vistas of the Upper Arkansas River Valley, enhancing the view from the campground. Turtle Rock is a prominent granite feature attracting rock climbers and hikers seeking a view of the Arkansas River below. The campground is nestled within a pinon pine and juniper woodland which covers the rolling hills of the Fourmile Recreation Area.
Nearby Attractions
The Fourmile Recreation Area is known for its robust trail system supporting hiking, trail running, biking and OHV riding. The Upper Arkansas River Valley is home to Central Colorado's iconic recreation including whitewater rafting and play park, 14ers, biking, hiking, fishing, festivals, concerts and so much more.
What the agency tells you
RV’s and Trailers longer than 35’ are not allowed at Turtle Rock Campground.
There are no hookup services, no trash collection services and no potable water.
Bring your own drinking water.
Everything else this campground posts · 6
Maximum length of stay is 14 days.
Individual campsites are limited to 8 people and 2 vehicles per site. Group campsites are limited to 20 people and 4 vehicles per site. Extra vehicles must park in the Day Use Parking area.
Quiet hours are 10:00 p.m. to 8:00 a.m. This includes, but not limited to, generators, music, loud voices and loud pets.
Generators during non-quiet hours are highly discouraged, for the consideration of other campers.
Check-in time is 1:00 pm. Check-out time is 11:00 am.
Pets must be on a leash at all times, clean up after your pets.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 24 · 4 tent-only, 1 walk-in, 1 group
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 35 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed at 22 of 24 sites
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…including 1 Group Site, and 1 double vault toilet. Individual sites are limited to 2 vehicles and 8…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “Drinking water, electric hook-ups and trash service are not available at Turtle Rock Campground so please bring your own water and plan to take your trash with you when you leave.”
- Firewood
- Mentioned
Around the campground
- On the water
- River
- Climbing
- Hiking
- Horseback riding
- Mountain biking
- Off Highway Vehicle Trails
- Wildlife viewing
Full this Saturdayread 15:52 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBookedNot reservable
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday. 1 is free on Mon, Oct 19. read 15:52 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 · 13
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $20 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
recreation.gov availability, read 15:52 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
24 sites
All 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. 19 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.
| Turtle Rock | 1 | standard nonelectric | 22 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 10 | tent only nonelectric | 15 ft | |
| Turtle Rock | 11 | walk to | ||
| Turtle Rock | 12 | tent only nonelectric | 15 ft | |
| Turtle Rock | 13 | standard nonelectric | 33 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 14 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 15 | standard nonelectric | 33 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 16 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 17 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 18 | standard nonelectric | 33 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 19 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 2 | standard nonelectric | 24 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 20 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 21 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 22 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 23 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 24 | standard nonelectric | 30 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 3 | standard nonelectric | 25 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 4 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 5 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 6 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | $20 |
| Turtle Rock | 7 | tent only nonelectric | 20 ft | |
| Turtle Rock | 9 | tent only nonelectric | 20 ft | |
| Turtle Rock | Group Site 1 (Site 8) | group standard nonelectric | 20 ft | $40 |
Getting there
the agency’s directions · the phone number
The weather
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
The land, and who answers for it
a letter you can send
Who can change it · 2
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.
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJohn W. HickenlooperU.S. Senator · Colorado
- Your senator, on the same appropriationMichael F. BennetU.S. Senator · Colorado
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 Turtle Rock Campground, Colorado
Dear John W. Hickenlooper, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Turtle Rock Campground, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 24 sites at Turtle Rock Campground 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Turtle Rock Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Turtle Rock Campground. I’m asking you to put it to the Bureau of Land Management 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 Turtle Rock Campground (Colorado) 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 Turtle Rock Campground, Colorado
Dear Michael F. Bennet, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Turtle Rock Campground, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 24 sites at Turtle Rock Campground 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Turtle Rock Campground keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Turtle Rock Campground. I’m asking you to put it to the Bureau of Land Management 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 Turtle Rock Campground (Colorado) via campanac.com