Waka Lu Hep Yo
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $35From, per site
- Sites
- 5All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 1 notices
In the agency’s own words
For over 2000 years the Miwuk people lived seasonally in this canyon, gathering food, and fishing the river. The Miwuk word WaKaLuu means river and Hep Yoo describes an untamed or wild force of nature. This beautiful campground is set in mature conifer and oak forest on the North Fork Stanislaus River.
What the agency tells you
The Forest Service operates the WakaLu Hep Yo Campground and charges the following fees: $35 per night in 2026. The America the Beautiful Interagency Senior and Access Passes are honored and receive 50% off the nightly rate. Only applicable to the single site the pass holder occupies. The Interagency Annual and Volunteer passes do not provide any discounts on camping. Reservations required via Recreation.gov The only species of bears in California are black bears. It is not uncommon to see bears in campgrounds. For more information, visit www.keepmewild.org
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 5
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 30 ft
- Paved pads
- All
- Accessible sites
- 5
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- VAULT TOILETS on 5 of 5 campsite records
- Drinking water
- Yes
- WATER SPIGOT on 1 of 5 campsite records
Around the campground
- On the water
- River
- Night sky · 628th darkest of 1,201 in CA
- Bortle 3
Nothing on the booking system for the next 30 nightsread 15:40 UTC
Every site here is reservable, and the record lists none held back for anyone who drives up.
Every one of the next thirty nights is in recreation.gov’s record and not one site is being offered on any of them. That’s a campground closed or not yet released for booking, not a sold-out one.
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.
We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.
Every line of the receipt · 16
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $35 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 15:40 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
5 sites
All 5 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. 5 of the 5 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Wakalu Hep Yo (Wild River) CampgroundStanislaus National Forest · 0.1 miBig Meadow CampgroundStanislaus National Forest · 8.9 mi
Big Meadow (Stanislaus National Forest)Stanislaus National Forest · 9.0 miSand Bar Flat CampgroundStanislaus National Forest · 10 miBeardsley Dam CampgroundStanislaus National Forest · 11 miMokelumne CampgroundEldorado National Forest · 11 miTake Highway 4 to Dorrington; turn onto Boards Crossing Road and continue five miles northeast to the campground. The campground entrance is on the left before the Stanislaus River bridge.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Dorrington, CA
Typical weather
Typical October night 43°F, day 64°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical December night 30°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
who answers for it
Who answers for this land
Waka Lu Hep Yo 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 →