Odessa Campground

Off season visit, Sept 14: This campground is pretty minimal, and one key thing to note is that only a few sites have tables, and a few sites are just a place to park a car and a firepit. But the birds I saw as I was setting up my tent and wandering around were more various than I typically see in campgrounds, so that was nice. 

There is no water, and no trash. There is a vault toilet, and the camping is free. There are no bear boxes. I was mostly concerned about the lack of bear boxes and trash due to my status as a bike camper, with no car to separate bears and food. And in fact, I woke up about a half an hour after falling asleep to what I thought was a raccoon batting at the side of my tent. Probably smelling the empty jerky bag. I sat up a long time wondering what to do. I ended up asking one of my neighbors who was still up to put my food bag in her car, which worked great, except she didn't want to wake up early. We compromised on 8, and that was that. I heard a rustling in the bushes a few times in the middle of the night, but it didn't sound big enough to be a raccoon. 

In the morning, I expected the dawn chorus to be amazing, but it was dominated by some really rawcous jays, I think. They were not happy. And then, when I was packing up my tent, I heard the rustling again, and looked in the bushes. And saw a cute little feral kitten. Terrible in a bird refuge, I know, I know. I love birds. And also cats. It was not a dumb cat, either. It was very standoffish, until I started meowing at it, and then it knew I was a sucker, so it started mewing back at me, and followed me to the bathroom. I let it be, but still thought it was damn cute. 

Free campsite with vault toilet and a lot of birds

Good ATT coverage and a nice spot right on the lake


Nice free site 

Stayed here off season in the fall passing through the area. Beautiful but gets pretty chilly at night. Only stayed here for sleeping but campground was pretty empty. Nice free camping.

Passing through 

Great free campground to enjoy the beautiful calm branch of the upper Klamath lake!  More like a river!  

Beautiful peaceful!  But the bugs!

Really nice chill camp with a lot of spots, fire pits. You can camp right by the river, only problem there are a lot of mosquitos, but hey, it's by a river

First camp we camped in Oregon

Similar to other reviews, be sure not to turn into the Odessa ranch. The road I turned in to was unmarked, and was a long stretch with multiple groups dispersed along the road.

Once you get to the campsite, you'll know when you see the campground sign. The sign also had a warning for "Day Use Only", but I wouldn't let that scare you off from staying the night.

Vault toilet was useable during my visit.

Camp sites weren't far from each other, but visability was blocked from one another. That night, I was the only one staying there inside the campground. I slept comfortably with no one bothering me.

Also! Since it's right by the lake, expect to say hi to some mosquitos. :)

It Works! But, beware of Bugs! :)

Odessa Campground 

The Drive is easy to find. I used my apple maps, (not google) and it took us down the correct road. It is not marked. The road itself isn’t bad at all. A few pot holes and ruts but nothing our camper couldn’t navigate. 

THE CAMPGROUND 
The camp itself is exactly what others have mentioned, day use only. So we found a secluded spot in the woodland area to set up camp then went back to the “DAY USE AREA” to make lunch and possibly take our canoe out on the water. 

Our only vehicle being our camper meant we had to leave the camp behind and travel in to have a nice day, it got ruined by the Barney5-O of park rangers. He thought since we were driving a “camper” and not a car, that we were camping and gave us holy heck! In all my experiences with rangers, they’ve all been nice and helpful. This guy is either the worst of the lot, needs to retire or was having a bad day and took it out on us. Needless to say, if you have a camper don’t hang out in the day at the day use area. 

Every single “camp” spot had loads of trash in the fire pits and even some spots had bags of trash thrown into the nearby bushes. 
The spot right outside of the campground had 5-6 dead ducks thrown into a bush and feathers all over the place. Along with trash. 

There are people in spots here who look as tho they live here. They all have dogs that bark all day and all night. Not sure if the barking is an actual dog or a recording. They also have their generators going non stop, metal skirting around their campers and tarps on the roofs. Pretty sure they’re permanent residents. 

The highway noise is so loud that it sounds like a race course also… all day and night long. 

A couple of kids on dirt bikes stopped by our camp on the road, then hightail-wheelied it right on by kicking up dust that i could taste in my mouth for 3 hours afterwards. 

There is also a road off to the left that rutted, don’t take it. Some hills have eyes people live down there and it connects to the permanent camper that it right outside of the “official day use area”. Couldn’t get a lot of pictures of that, there was a guy staring at us from his migshift work shop, at least a dozen or so cars that reminded me of a horror movie i watched once. 
My guess is don’t drink the water. That brings me to the WATER situation. 

LAKE
We were going to take our canoe out but the water is too low and it looks like a dry creek. We tried to find this vast body of water but it was nowhere to be found. 

Three bars of LTE anywhere in the campgrounds and “day use area”

Nearest town for amenities of any sort would be Klamath Falls. A near 17-24 miles, depending on the route you take. 

Would i return? Absolutely not. But there’s no better way to experience your surroundings by only staying a night or a few. 
