Best Tent Camping near Fairfield, ID

 There are about 6 designated spots here in this free little campground.  Camping is allowed in designated sites only and there is a 10 day stay limit.

Site #1 is all by itself to the right at the fork, and it was the best site, in our opinion. 

Each site has a fire pit (no fires allowed at this time!). There is no picnic bench. There is one vault toilet and no garbage collection and no water.  There are no bear boxes but proper bear proof food storage is required.

A small creek runs along this campground and the views are incredible. Nice shade cover and trees. This area is fine dirt and so-so in terms of flat spots. Campground is right on the road so you hear the cars but considering how beautiful and free the campground it, the cars aren’t bothersome. Plus it quiets down at night. 

Zero cell service.

 There are about 6 designated spots here in this free little campground.  Camping is allowed in designated sites only and there is a 10 day stay limit.

Site #1 is all by itself to the right at the fork, and it was the best site, in our opinion. 

Each site has a fire pit (no fires allowed at this time!). There is no picnic bench. There is one vault toilet and no garbage collection and no water.  There are no bear boxes but proper bear-proof food storage is required.

A small creek runs along this campground and the views are incredible. Nice shade cover and trees. This area is fine dirt and so-so in terms of flat spots. Campground is right on the road so you hear the cars but considering how beautiful and free the campground it, the cars aren’t bothersome. Plus it quiets down at night. 

Zero cell service.

This is a tent only campground(there is nowhere for RVs to turn around, and backing out would be a horrific proposition) with only seven sites. The best sites are the four that are on the creek side of the camp road. There is a vault toilet(not especially clean) and a bear proof dumpster, and lots of signs about bears, but no bear boxes for food storage. The campsites are nicely shaded, but not especially private(you can see most of the sites from each other). This campground is$2 cheaper than the next closest campground(I drove to the other site to check it out and returned here because except for the price, they were about the same). There is a pretty cool avalanche/rock slide up the road that is impressive in size and there are some pretty cool beaver dams and lodges in the creek/marshy area that feeds into the river. Be careful picking a site along the creek as it runs pretty close to the edge of two sites and I suspect the sites get flooded during big rains(due to the beaver dams). Showers are not terribly far away at Redfish Lake Park.

My wife and I were forced to make last minute changes to our camping trip this year(thanks to the Wapiti 2024 fire in Stanley) and Dog Creek was the only campground available on the dates we had set aside. We had been up to Pine once before but had never explored past the town. 

The campground itself is quiet and away from the main road but it is directly parallel to the South Fork of the Boise River. There are a TON of ponderosa pines and other various pine trees so the campground looks small because of the dense tree cover. From the main road, the main drive is a fairly narrow paved dirt/gravel road and not bumpy at all so most vehicles shouldn’t have an issue with it. 

The camp sites themselves are a little close to each other but you’re not shoulder to shoulder or directly on top of each other. The camp host greeted us upon our arrival, filled us in on the fire restrictions and said to let him know if we needed anything. 

We had reserved sites 10 and 11 but in reality, they might as well call it a group site because there is no separation between the two, you even share a"driveway”. There were fire rings, tent pads(at some sites) and picnic tables, along with shepherds hooks for hanging trash off of the ground. There were also metal tables at every site that we think are intended for camp stoves.(The picnic tables are wood)The fire rings were well cared for(none damaged that we saw and they all had adjustable grills)….but our fire ring was very close to the bushes which was a little sketchy. 

This campground is nice and quiet and full of trees. But unfortunately, for us, that’s where the appeal ends. In order to get to the actual Dog Creek from the campground, you have to hope that sites 2 and 5 are not occupied and even then, the creek isn’t super exciting. It’s pretty but it’s a climb down into a ravine of sorts and it’s not deep enough to lay in and there aren’t any places to setup chairs to just enjoy it. The water flowing through the creek is clean and it is pretty to look at, but that’s about all it’s good for. 

As for other things to do at the campground, there isn’t much. There are no hiking trails as far as we could tell, but if you go across the street to the river, you can actually enjoy your stay, assuming the banks of the river aren’t packed with dispersed campers and their ATV’s. 

The campground does have water spigots and the water tasted fine. The restrooms(vault toilets) were impeccable in terms of cleanliness. Some of the nicest Forest Service campground restrooms we’ve used and the camp host does an awesome job of keeping them clean and bug free. 

Speaking of bugs, we didn’t see many mosquitoes but we did see a good amount of bees, wasps and yellow jackets and there were traps setup throughout the campground so bring an epi pen if you’re allergic to any of them. 

We lost cell service just after the reservoir (T-Mobile) but my satellite communicator worked fairly well at the campground. 

There are dumpsters to take your trash just inside the entrance to the campground, which is a little annoying as you have to walk quite a ways to dump it, but there were also no critters hanging around the sites. 

Dog Creek campground is the type of campground where you setup your camper or RV and leave for the day to do other things. Whether it’s boating at Anderson Ranch, taking the ATV’s up into the mountains or try to find hiking trails. The campground itself is very pretty BUT it doesn’t offer much in terms of things to do while there. However, if you are looking for some peace and quiet, with very little noise from the outside world, it’s great.

We were driving through to Stanley, but it got dark before we were able to arrive so we found this spot. We arrived at dark and set up camp at about the 3rd or 4th spot in (3 day camp limit in this area). Woke up to the most wonderful views! Mountains, meadows, flowers, and a creek bed (our section was still dry).

You can still see peoples homes from this point and the locals seem to utilize the creek trail regularly with off leash dogs. Everyone was respectful keeping their distance except for one lovely lady who was on the phone and not paying ANY attention to where her dog was. She was several hundred feet away chatting it up, walking through our campsite while we had our own pups that we were having to restrain ourselves. Really careless and inconsiderate. Luckily we only saw her that one day as she stated to us they frequent the area.

Really didn’t encounter a whole lot of other campers. 1 van conversion was there as long as us and we talked to a gentleman in his truck our second day farther up the road when we were exploring the area.

If you drive to the end (go right when the road Y’s) there’s a crystal clear pond that feeds the creek. It has trout visible, several ducks, there’s a vault toilet, picnic table, and established fire ring with a grate of youd like to utilize it for cooking.

We were only supposed to stay here one night in our Class C but we stayed the full 3 days because it was just so beautiful! (Farther up the road is a 16 day limit also, you’ll see a sign when it changes).

We tow a Nissan Altima and it had no problems driving the unpaved road down to the first pond. There’s a second pond (go left at the Y) but we didn’t travel that way.

No trash, water, or RV dump here but you can find one ~20 min away here: (43.7948535, -114.4216629)

Alturas Lake Inlet campground is tucked into the lovely, shady forest around it. We saw plenty of birds, chipmunks and tiny wildflowers were all over our site in early July. The lake is a short walk but some campers drove over just to make it easier to tote their chairs and water gear. Bring layers - it can is cool in the evenings and at night (40s F) even in July but warm in the day, especially if you are out by the lake. We tent camped at site 17 and although it was near one of the many vault toilets, smaller trash dumpsters, and water spigots, our site was bigger and we set up a decent distance from it. Most sites seemed to have a good distance between each other and enough privacy courtesy of trees and various plant life. We didn’t have any issues, but there plenty of signs reminding campers to be bear aware. (We are pretty careful to keep our food, cooking supplies, toiletries and whatnot in our car when not in use anyway). We did not have cell service (Verizon) and it was a bit of a drive before we got it again. Overall, it’s a beautiful retreat well suited to escaping the heat of summer if you have a tent or small trailer/pull behind.