Best Cabin Camping near Metaline Falls, WA

I worked at Priest Lake State Park as a residential biologist for the summer of 2016. It was an amazing experience! I had access to parts of the park not allowed to campers. The staff are all very friendly and nice to work with. The hand- scooped homemade ice cream is worth it alone! Kayaking up the thoroughfare to the upper lake is a great workout with some amazing and beautiful scenery and animals along the way. You will see lots of moose, and sometimes black bears. If you take the short hike to Moose lake, there is excellent rainbow trout fishing, and gorgeous scenery as well. Hunt lake trail is a beautiful trail to hike, but not for beginners. Priest Lake itself is a little chilly when first getting in to swim, but is very refreshing in the mountain heat. There are many good places to pick huckleberries all over the area! The campgrounds at the Indian Creek unit, which is where the headquarters and store are located, are very clean. There are plenty of RV and tent camping sites and 5 cabins available to rent. All cabins sleep different numbers of people, ranging from 5 to 9, the moose cabin being the largest and nicest. The cabins have no bathrooms or kitchens but boast fire rings and are right across from communal park bathrooms and showers. The lion head unit on the upper lake is about 12 miles up the road from Indian Creek turning into gravel about 8 miles up right before moose lake. It has a few smaller camper sites and many tent sites available. There is a maintenance shed along with a small ranger booth which also serves as a small store with ice and other foods and small supplies. There are first aid kits and radios available at all campground ranger booths. Priest lake has amazing fishing for rainbow trout, Mackinaw (lake trout), smallmouth bass, and Pike minnow (as the main species). The nearest town, Coolin, UD, is about 12 miles down the road. It is a small town with a store, a diner and a bar/ restaurant. The diner and restaurant have decent staple foods for what they have to offer. The store is fairly small but generally has most of the foods and supplies needed for restocking your camping food or obtaining the odds and ends you may have forgotten or overlooked at home. All around it is a beautiful place to visit with friendly staff and locals and I would highly recommend it to anyone seeking an unforgettable family camping experience.

I enjoyed staying in the screen house cabin and will definitely be back. Lots to do in the area if you like fishing, hiking, biking, horses, and much more. I had a great campfire and watched a mama bear and her cub on the hill beyond the cabin!  Also saw deer in the driveway and the night sky was awesome with NO lights in any direction except the stats!

Great hosts and everything you need!

John

There are 3 campgrounds. One is a group camp that sells out quick. Reservations are 9 months in advance and it is a phone call of luck that will get you this prime area. The group camp has its own private dock and beach. The cabin has multiple bunk beds and a kitchen with fridge and range/oven. Also a microwave. 2 showers and 2 restrooms. There are RV slots available here. We love the privacy and ability to not worry about any unlocked vehicles or items left in the beach The other two sites are Lionhead and Indian Creek. Indian Creek as a store and laundry facilities. They also have a few cabins to rent. Showers and rv slots available. Lionhead is further up the road (just north of the group camp) and is a little smaller.

We love it! Beautiful area the staff is always friendly and accommodating The cabins are rustic but clean We now bring our RV and really enjoy our stays here There a lake, a restaurant snd small store and lots of trails for hiking snd biking It's a great place stay Fall spring and Summer

Perfect lake to swim in that is connected to a larger ski lake with a channel so there is not heavy boat traffic on the ski lake.

It was a nice place to stay near the trail system. Indoor shower and bathroom. I did find it a little odd that there was a strange glory hole in my room.

It is a gorgeous area. Our spot was about 20 feet from the water. Sandy campsite is a nice change of pace from dirt ( although I love dirt😁). The staff were incredible friendly and welcoming. I am a solo camper +🐶 and I felt very safe here. Very family friendly place. I really just wish more places would allow dogs at the beach or even have a nice sectioned off part for the doggies. Very heartbreaking to be so close to that beautiful water and not be able to enjoy it because I couldn't bring my bestie. 😕 Otherwise, I love it and will return!!

Ended our tour of Northern Idaho at spot #140. Tons of flat area to put down a tent, mosquito shade (they are pretty bad), and enjoy the amazing view!

Bathrooms with vault toilets, water pump, and grey water dump all just a short walk away

All the state (not Federal) parks at both Priest and Lake Pend Oreille (Farragut) have become prohibitively expensive for out of staters. Per the Boise newspaper a state legislator from Hayden. ID was angered that he was unable to camp the state parks in his area at the drop of a hat 'due to the large number of out of state campers'(who had the foresight to make reservations months in advance). He was able to push a punitive bill through the State legislature which effectively more than doubled out of state camp fees in these two parks. Not only is the camp site at least twice as expensive but there is now a daily vehicle fee added. A basic campsite (no utilities) can now cost upwards of $70 per night.

Lionhead is by far my favorite campground of hundreds I’ve been to. it’s designed more for tent camping of very small rv’s such as truck campers or tent trailers. There are numerous trails to explore and the beach is beautiful white sand with crystal clear water. Indian Creek is also nice and has a store with everything you could need and ice cream by the scoop. Indian Creek also has full and partial hookup sites - free hot showers- and boat slips to rent.

SO! you get to this campground via boat only. There is a thoroughfare between upper and lower Priest Lake. Once when I camped there, we were in an overloaded canoe in a thunderstorm. I would not advise that route of access :) That trip included an amazing experience though. After the storm blew through, camp had been established and dinner was over, we set out in the canoe. It was Wednesday, in early summer. No other campsites were occupied on Upper Priest, we were the only ones there. As dusk deepened, the stars came out and the lake was so calm is was a perfect mirror. The stars were visible in the lake. Down became up and up was down and all was well in the world for a time that evening on Upper Priest!

I’ve been to Priest countless times. Camp in the woods or on the beach. Upper or lower Priest Lake.

Campground was clean and spread out. There was a day use peach nearby so was a little loud with volleyball players and day use people. The Lake is gorgeous! Paddle Boarding, boating, kayaking...all a great time!

Ashley here with The Dyrt. We'd like to welcome your host Lindsay to our platform. This unique stay comes with a hot shower and gorgeous views. Book your stay today and come back here to leave them some love.

We walked up to reserve our site. The sites are pretty close but have nice facilities throughout the campground. Including a nice store with an Ice cream shop, a family favorite.

Had a family reunion at this campground. Loved every second of this place. Started by playing frisbee golf at their awesome new course. Had our puppy with us and he had an absolute blast.

Cute little store that had all kinds of local art and everything you’ll need for camping. We were blessed with a few amazing thunderstorms that put a damper on fishing, but had a great time watching the storms pass.

We did get some fishing in for cutthroat and lake trout. Cutthroat are catch and release so we had to be pretty careful, but the lake trout tasted amazing.

Amazing camp hosts stopped by regularly and were so nice. Bathrooms were clean and showers were hot. All in all, had a great time at this campground and we plan on going back this next spring.

My family and i visit here at least twice a year. We love views and there is always something to do. Wish they had more sites with sewer hook ups but they do have a very easy to use dump station on site.

Chip & Bunny are the greatest hosts! We had to leave a day early (without notice) due to the fires being close to our home and they refunded the one night back to us without even being asked. We surely didn’t expect that! We will be back again.

We stayed here a week in late July. Weather was great for hanging out in the lake all day swimming and kayaking. We had no problem getting around in our 50 ft rig. We got 2 sites side by side for our camping partners. Nice grassy area for group activities. A thunder and lightning storm 1 night to keep it interesting. Hosts were great and I know they have plenty of rules but we didn't feel like we were being watched the whole time. Be aware of bees during the day and mosquitoes at night.

Super quiet

This place has showers and bathrooms which were great after a day floating on the river which is just a short drive away. Great tent camping with group camping available. Sites have a lot of room, table, fire pit, garbage can and easy walk to rest of campground.