Canyon Campground — Yellowstone National Park

This campsite was beautiful.

The sites are spread out and spread between the trees.  Even with every site full, you still have space.

Every site has a fire ring and a bear box.  Each loop has its own restrooms and dish wash station.  Each loop is farther back from the main road and the overall campground is large.

The check in building also has laundry and showers.  You get a punch card when you check in that gives you one free shower per person per day for your stay, and additional can be purchased.  This building also sells ice, firewood, and other essentials.  

Several gift shops, food options (gasp), and a gas station are just across or down the main road from checkin.

At checkin we were told there were less bear sightings as some of the other campgrounds in the park.  They still have a bear policy that says no scents outside of hard sided vehicles or bear box.  We were told the rangers are more likely to give you trouble for breaking the policy than the bears were, and while bear spray was recommended, it would not save you from a ticket from the rangers.   

Quiet hours begin at 8pm, after which rvs cannot run their generators.  The rangers actually drive around and enforce this, which is wonderful!  

I would recommend making sure you have enough gas to get you out of the park to the nearest town.  While there are several 24 hour pumps in the park including one right near the campground, the entire park lost power during our visit, and none of the gas pumps worked on the day we were leaving.

Also if you have T-mobile, there is coverage for emergency calls only in this part of the park.

Stayed 4 nights at Canyon Campground tent only loop B. We used it as a base to explore the park. Most other tent campers only stay 1 or 2 nights. While this is definitely the cheapest way to stay inside the park there are some MAJOR cons.

1. All the sites are right on top of each other and there is no privacy at all.
2. Loop B (where they seem to stick single small-medium tents) is literally off the registration/laundry/shower/Recycling/garbage/dump station. (Read more below about specific sights in loop B)
3. Because it’s Yellowstone all types come here—including people who have absolutely no clue about camp etiquette. (We were woken up two of the four nights because two different people in the loop behind us decided to use their car lights to set up or (no clue what the others were doing) their sites—we’re talking 1 am car lights shining directly into the tents or ignoring rules about locking all food related items (containers and grills) away when not in use.
4. Related—Guests can check in whenever—like at 1 am
5. You’re right off the exit of North Rim Drive. (Some of the sights in loop b back up to the road). It is heavily traveled. Also there are rivets in the road to warn people to stop near by—at about 6 am you wake up to construction crews, workers, and guests driving over them.

The positives: restrooms were clean, but by the first week of September half of them were closed despite the loop being full.

LOOP B SITES to avoid: 31, 32, 33, 34. These literally overlook the RV parking lot for the registration/garbage facilities. (Pics below)

There is no walk-in reservation access this year for YNP camping. One must have advance reservations.

Canyon has intermittent & spotty cell connection. Canyon, like Old Faithful, is a prime location within the park and has amenities like showers  (not during Covid) & access to a well operated cafeteria and visitor center.

If you are tenting, try to avoid loop A for certain--- and possible loop B.

For RV people you must reserve in advance the length of vehicle you are pulling.

For tent people, it is best to reserve a "large tent" space even if you do not have a large size tent. You will achieve a more versatile site.

Many sites are not level, but if you arrive early in the day the campground office personnel will work with you to achieve a better site if possible.

Most large tent sites will stand 2 tents. Reserve accordingly if you have 2 cars…and the length of your cars. They need details. Bathrooms are serviced often and are in good condition. 

wifi hint:  At Canyon campground the best wifi is located at the nearby gas station parking lot.

We stayed in two different sites here. I171 and our second one was K242. I would have done research and requested specific numbers looking back, as I think Yellowstone would have tried to get us the right sites. We had a campervan and pop up tent. We stayed here on a Friday and a Sunday. We thought it seemed like all sites had a lot of shade.

I171 was a better site. We were less close to neighbors and had a bear box. The site was huge and clean. We had some people using generators outside of appropriate hours.

K242 did not have a bear box and we were really tight next to neighbors including a huge family who left a bunch of food and stuff out when they weren’t at the site. We got eaten ALIVE by mosquitos at this site (not a single bite at the other Canyon site, no idea why). It was so bad we put of the fire and spent the evening inside the van.

Besides the idiots you will encounter anywhere, staff was really nice and the facilities were well maintained. We did think we would get showers at the campsite because we booked really far in advance and they are currently closed (June 2021). Luckily we have an outdoor shower on the van, but this would have been a big deal if not.

There is a dump site and water fill up as you exit which is really convenient.

Pro Tip: If you are going with a van or small RV and say you are not using a tent, they’ll likely put you in a really small, tight campsite in the inner ring. Instead, select the right vehicle length and say you are bringing a tent. We brought a pop-up canopy because we weren’t sure if our site would have shade and booked a tent/19 foot spot. We were given a bigger spot because of this I think.

Also note every day we checked in after 1PM there we’re walk in people who got sites which I have NO IDEA how. The sign outside the campground said “full.” I wouldn’t bank on this, but I was surprised.

Pictures from I171.

I was able to snag a spot at Canyon Campground for few days at the height of busy season. (I kept the campground reservation page open on my computer and would refresh every hour. I had one campground per tab. Finally got a cancelation at Canyon, so took it. But it can be done!!)

Our spot was pretty small and right by a water spigot that everyone used, so that was a bit annoying. Lots of small pine trees make it feel more spaced out. Luckily, there was no one camped behind us (no spaces there), so that was nice. We were situated near a screaming kid, so that was not so nice. Not the campground's fault though. It is what it is.

Big bear box to hold everything, but we were told it is also fine to lock stuff in your car. (The bears here allegedly don't break into cars like they do at Yosemite.) Nice picnic table and fire pit. Bathrooms have flushing toilets and a nice room for dishwashing. 

During COVID, the showers down at the shower room by where  you check in are closed. So no showers for us. (If this is important to you, check the Yellowstone NPS site to see if and when they reopen. Showers at all the campgrounds in the park were closed.) They did kick back a couple bucks per night for the lack of showers.

We were able to find a flat enough area for two 2+ tents, but there's no official tent pad.

My favorite part of this campground? You can hear the thundering Yosemite Falls in the distance. Best white noise ever!

Least favorite part of the campground? The bathroom lights are always on, so if you are in a site near the bathrooms, you always have light shining into your site from that building.

There's ice, firewood and a camp store down by the checkin. There's a place to drop off trash and recycling out front, as well.

From our loop (E), the village was a long walk or short drive. I have Verizon and got an okay signal (one to two bars) in camp and a much better signal in the parking lot of the village. (As a professor, I did go down to the village parking lot a couple of evenings and used my phone to create a hot spot so I could do some grading for an online summer class.) 

In the village, the cafeteria seemed to be open until about 10pm. One night, I took a little drive around to Yosemite Falls (no crowds late in the day!) and came across a black bear by the road into the falls, which was cool.

Note that all of this was during COVID times, so it wasn't a "normal" Yellowstone experience. At the time, only a handful of the park lodges were open and only 4 of the park's 12 campgrounds were open.