Swan Lake Trading Post & Campground

Small and pretty area but there were big deal breakers for us. We spent 2 nights here tent camping as part of a longer motorcycle camping trip.

First and foremost, the store was closed. They have a store on site but it's closed until 2022. It would have been nice because the closest thing to a grocery store is 15 miles away.

Second, there are no defined campsites. It's first come first served around a little pond on the property. It's nicely shaded and quiet, but there are NO picnic tables for tent sites and no dedicated fire rings. So if you show up later in the day, you might be SOL for a fire. The RV sites have picnic tables. I bring this up because it's a really nice thing to have when you're tent camping.  A place to cook, sit, put some of the crap you're hauling (especially if you're like us and on motorcycles with limited storage).

Third, the bathrooms and showers were cleaned up on a regular basis which was really nice but no hot water later on in the day. After a long, hard day of riding I just wanted to wash all the grossness off and was in freezing cold water.

This small campground packs a tremendous punch! RVs (if I had to guess, accommodates 8-12 total), rustic cabins, two yurts, and pondside tent sites - there are no defined tent sites; anywhere along the pond perimeter is fair game.

We stayed just one night in one of the yurts ($35 summer 2021), which is equipped with two cots and a battery-operated lantern. After checking in with the camp hosts (who are lovely!), we got a key to the showers, bathrooms, and laundry room. The hosts keep these areas immaculate, cleaning often. There's also very limited wifi on the porch just outside the bathrooms/showers.

The campground has a great vibe and everyone is very friendly. Between the pond and Swan Lake just across the street, it is buggy, but you cannot beat the location! 

The general store is still closed due to flooding last summer, but new construction is well underway.

For full disclosure we were compensated for this trip for testing the Dyrt's reservation system.

Our trip to Swan Lake Trading Post & Campground started out by reserving the campground through The Dyrts's new reservation system. Reserving the site was extremely easy and fast to use, way better than other systems we have used before. We had a confirmation from the campground with in a few hours of using the reservation system.

Now for the campground. We were highly impressed by this small campground. The tent camping area was located around a small pond/lake. The site has picnic tables and fire rings as well as plenty of chairs available for siting around the fire or along the little lake. The campground has 8 RV sites, 3 cabins and 3 yurts (the yurts had not been set up for the season during our visit). The trading post has all your basic camping needs and anything you need if you forget something, they even have Ice Cream. If you don't want to cook breakfast the trading post will take care of that for you by cooking up a breakfast sandwich for you. The campground provides clean restrooms and showers. Tent sites were very reasonable at $20, just two more dollars than the Forest Service campground down the road which does not have flush toilets or showers. The camp host are very friendly. We were provided with the camps wifi password, but you do have to be on the trading post back porch to use it. The porch has plenty of table an chairs for sitting at. They also have games you can use to pass the time, we didn't use them but was nice to know they were available. It was nice and quiet at night with very little traffic on the highway, plus the creek running by really muffled any noise from vehicles driving by. This campground will definitely be on our list to stay at the next time we visit the Swan Valley and Swan Lake.