Best Cabin Camping near North Cascades National Park

What a lovely campground! There’s a day use area with a bathroom and picnic tables right before entering into the campground. This place allows you to pay to park in the lots for $15/night if you are occupying it which is nice when the campground is full. There’s trash bins located throughout the campground as well as restrooms and shower houses (quarters needed). Dump station is $5. Several free options to pick from based on your setup. If you are paying to overnight park in the parking lot, you technically are not supposed to be using any of the amenities within the campground itself including the shower. If you speak with the Office and allow to pay them directly. They are very accommodating to allow you the bathroom code for the showers. They ask you only stay one night in the parking lot but you can ask for an extra night but get approval.

There’s a bar and grill across the road with pizza and dog friendly. There’s trails around the campground to walk. Very pretty views of the water at half the sites. Camp hosts were very kind and came around at night to check to make sure everyone paid to stay so make sure you do if you are in the parking lot! Had fantastic ATT service and was able to work well. Varied from 3-4 bars of 5G. Only 30 minutes from NC NP entrance. Definitely would stay here again!

I generally enjoyed this location in North Cascades National Park. It is a beautiful area with hikes nearby and chilly swimming. Mosquitos weren’t bad which was a relief. However, sites at this campground are close together and not very private. It feels a bit like a carnival at times instead of camping in the woods.

We found ourselves in the middle of the Pace family reunion while visiting. Apparently all the adults coordinated and rented sites by each other for this event instead of renting a group site. The adults yelled across our site to each other, their children ran through our site to adjacent ones, and they were up and noisy by 6 AM. We also were treated to dirty looks, I’m guessing because it was their “usual spot”? They said they camped there for over 30 years so they clearly feel like it’s their private park at this point. This certainly impacted our enjoyment, and ability to relax.

In the future, we will consider a site away from the water for more privacy.

Despite the presence of bears, there was also a pretty cavalier attitude to bear safety and adherence to those rules. There were a lot of kids and adults day drinking so they just weren’t as alert as they should be. This can put those around them at greater risk for a bear encounter. A fed bear is a dead bear, so this was frustrating to witness.

Campgrounds are full. Camping is one of the safest ways to get out and about yet still practice social distancing. Luckily we planned our trip before COVID-19 appeared and we were able to go on our trip in spite of COVID. And luckily we had reservations. Colonial Creek South Campground on Diablo Lake was a wonderful place to camp. Our site was big enough for our A Frame Pop Up camper and it had a nice private picnic table and tent area we could have used if we’d had extra people camping with us. We were right across from the camp sites that backed up to Diablo Lake and have already scoped a camp site on that side we’d love to check out next summer. There’s lots of lovely hikes in the area. The campground was kept very clean. Kayaking, boating, swimming (although the water is cold) - the lake is a beautiful turquoise jewel in the heart of the North Cascades. We can’t wait to go back.

So many people have dusted off their camping gear or bought new gear and are out and about. Colonial Creek North Campground, which is not reservable, was full mid week. Usually we’ve been able to get non-reserved camp sites mid week easily. So just a word to the wise if you are going camping, arrive early or get reservations where possible.