Best Cabin Camping near Clearlake Oaks, CA

Location • state park located north of Sonoma and an hour south of Mendocino • in the Virgina redwood forest • closest town: about 6 miles away

Facilities • Bathrooms & showers easily accesible for all sites - cleaned regularly • some bathrooms updated very recently • Spigots every few sites with good draining • campfire theatre • firewood sold on premises • about 70 campsites • some cabins • day use picnic area • wheelchair accesible trails

Ambiance • quiet hours 10pm - 8am • mostly families • dogs allowed on leash

Sites • Small to medium, close together • More open than private; good for groups who need multiple sites • Most hace at least part shade throughout the day • ring fire pits with grill • wooden food locker at each site • wooden picnic table at each site • enough space for 3-4 cars

Things to do • Variety of easy hikes/walks • drive to Mendocino • wine tasting in town

Beware • Poison oak

Spacious sites with fire pit, wooden food box and picnic table. Potable water available at spigots along the roads every 3-4 campgrounds. The campground has restrooms with sinks (bring your own soap), flush toilets, coin operated showers. Campground ha easy access to hiking, swimming in the river, and wine tasting just up the road. There a local produce stands just up the road where you can expect to buy tasty Gravenstien apples if you visit in August! Mosquitoes are present so bring bug spray! If you forget anything, there is a Mom and Pop store up the road that sells almost everything you need including batteries, tableclothes, butane, ice and firewood for about $6 a bundle. The campground host sells firewood for $8 a bundle. Campsites are for 8 people maximum. Even with 8 people, we didn't feel cramped. Sites come with 2 parking passes. If you have more than two cars in your party, you can pay for additional parking passes. Dog friendly! I was the only person in my group to have cell service here and I have Verizon.

A simple, rustic cabin.  As noted by others, it suffers from a little damage/neglect—many of the windows are boarded up—but it's an old fire lookout so we didn't expect a rental cabin atmosphere.  Views are exceptional, as is the peace and quiet.  Get up early and you'll catch the dawn chorus of an amazing number of birds: warblers, woodpeckers, quail, juncos, grosbeaks, cowbirds, even robins.  The cabin is roughly outfitted with cots, bunkbeds, a table and chairs.  There's a clean outhouse down by where you park and a firepit, which we didn't use because it was windy when we were there.  Keep your food up on the table at night--the mice are nocturnal visitors and will help themselves if you leave food on the counter.  Only caveat is the access to the cabin.  They're not kidding when they warn you to bring a chainsaw.  Two of the three roads in and out were blocked by downed trees (so big our small chainsaw wasn't helpful), and in places the road that was open had pretty deep potholes and gullies formed by last winter's heavy rains.  I was really glad we had 4WD.

My family has vacationed near the Russian River for generations and I absolutely love this area. I was intrigued by the new addition of an “AutoCamp” as I’d never heard of such a thing before. It’s basically glamping; they have airstream trailers set up and you rent one and use it like a stationary cabin. They also have some semi permanent canvas tents set up. They maintain toilets for units that aren’t self-sustained in that department and have an impressive selection of well stocked accommodations. Not necessarily my gig, but I’d look into it. Notably, many of their sites are not dog friendly, and the Russian River is one of the most dog friendly places on earth, so keep that in mind.

This campground (glampground?) is not right on the river (although there are a lot of places that are, none of which are currently showing up on The Dyrt — hopefully we can fix that), but is probably a five minute walk. It’s also close to the quirky historic town of Guerneville where you can shop at the old five and ten store and get all the river paraphernalia you need (enormous unicorn flotation rings, you know, the works). There are fabulous restaurants, a brand new ice cream parlor in the old bank building (it works, check it out!) and a sweet used bookstore. This is a great place to spend at least a week.