Whitehorse Campground
- Right now
- Listed not openA database flag with no reason and no date
- A night
- $31From, per site
- Sites
- 19All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 5 notices
In the agency’s own words
Whitehorse campground is located within three miles of Bucks Lake in the northern Sierra Mountains on the Plumas National Forest. The Bucks Lake area offers year-round recreation activities including fishing, hiking, snowmobiling, skiing,snowshoeing and horseback riding. Keep reading
Recreation
Staying at the Whitehorse campground provides access to several activites located in the greater Bucks Lake area. Fishing, boating, and canoeing, as well as hiking are all activities that can be achieved by staying in this campground. There are walking trails to the lake. A hiking trail runs from the campground and provides access to the Bucks Lake Wilderness and the Pacific Crest Trail. Marinas and boat docks are also within a short drive as well as restaurants at the Lakeside Resort and Bucks Lake Lodge which will re-open under new management in the summer for 2025, weather permitting. Limited supplies and a deli are located at the Haskins Valley Store just a short drive away.
Facilities
Your camping fees make a difference!!! In 2024 this campground recieved new concrete picnic tables and bear proof food storage lockers in most campsites. Vault toilets, water and trash services are on site as well.
Natural Features
This campground is set in a fir and pine forest offering shade during the warm summer months. Situated at 5,500 feet in elevation, the campground is settled along a small creek that feeds into Bucks Lake.
Nearby Attractions
The nearby Bucks Lake Lodge has a bar, restaurant and store offering fishing supplies and groceries.
What the agency tells you
Sites 1 to 7 are First Come/ First Serve. Fee envelopes are located at the information boards near the entrance of the campground. There is also a QRcode that can be scanned and used if the app for recreation.gov is already loaded on your smart device.
Generally, campsites will accommodate 2 vehicles. The first vehicle is included in the site fee, the second vehicle fee will be collected onsite at the daily rate posted on the fee sign.
Check- In is 2:00pm and Check-Out is Noon
Everything else this campground posts · 2
Campground Map
Bears frequent the area. Some campsites have new food storage lockers so please use them. Store food in a vehicle and out of sight if a food storage locker is not available.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 19 · 3 equestrian
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 39 ft
- Paved pads
- All
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…food storage lockers in most campsites. Vault toilets, water and trash services are on site as well.…”
- Bear boxes
- Yes
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, Creek
- Boating
- Night sky · 368th darkest of 1,201 in CA
- Bortle 3
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
Every site here is reservable, and the record lists none held back for anyone who drives up.
No availability snapshot inside the last 36 hours, so this page draws nothing rather than ageing a reading into fiction.
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.
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, $31 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
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
19 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 19 mapped sitesAll 19 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 19 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.
| A | 01 | standard nonelectric | 124 ft | 309 ft | $31 | |
| A | 02 | standard nonelectric | 31 ft | 70 ft | 284 ft | $31 |
| A | 03 | standard nonelectric | 29 ft | 70 ft | 245 ft | $31 |
| A | 04 | standard nonelectric | 36 ft | 91 ft | 179 ft | $31 |
| A | 05 | standard nonelectric | 39 ft | 73 ft | 176 ft | $31 |
| A | 06 | standard nonelectric | 37 ft | 73 ft | 169 ft | $31 |
| A | 07 | standard nonelectric | 36 ft | 117 ft | 204 ft | $31 |
| B | 08 | standard nonelectric | 75 ft | 132 ft | $31 | |
| B | 09 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | 114 ft | $31 | |
| B | 10 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | 112 ft | $31 | |
| B | 11 | standard nonelectric | 71 ft | 75 ft | $31 | |
| B | 12 | standard nonelectric | 69 ft | 141 ftWhitehorse Creek | $31 | |
| B | 13 | standard nonelectric | 163 ft | 31 ftWhitehorse Creek | $31 | |
| B | 14 | standard nonelectric | 82 ft | 43 ftWhitehorse Creek | $31 | |
| B | 15 | standard nonelectric | 82 ft | 34 ftWhitehorse Creek | $31 | |
| B | 16 | equestrian nonelectric | 77 ft | 140 ftWhitehorse Creek | $31 | |
| B | 17 | equestrian nonelectric | 77 ft | 154 ftWhitehorse Creek | $31 | |
| B | 18 | equestrian nonelectric | 69 ft | 204 ftWhitehorse Creek | $31 | |
| B | 19 | standard nonelectric | 20 ft | 82 ft | 209 ft | $31 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Mill Creek Campground (Plumas)Plumas National Forest · 3.1 mi
HutchinsPlumas National Forest · 3.1 mi
Sundew Campground (CA)Plumas National Forest · 3.4 mi
Grizzly Creek Campground (CA)Plumas National Forest · 3.8 miPhysical Address: 14551 Bucks Lake Road, Bucks Lake, California
From Quincy: Take Oroville-Quincy Hwy west 15 miles to the campground which will be on your left. If you have a large RV you will need to take Oroville-Quincy Hwy, left onto Big Creek Road, right on Bucks Lake Road, and the campground will be on your right.
From Oroville: Take Oroville-Quincy Hwy 162 East. Left on Bucks Lake Road and campground will be on your right.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Bucks Lake, CA
Typical weather
Typical October night 36°F, day 66°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical December night 25°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
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
Whitehorse Campground is in California’s 3rd congressional district. Its representative, Kevin Kiley (I), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →