Black Pine Lake Campground

I have been here a few times during travels through the area. We typically stop here to swim, paddle board and relax after cruising the North Cascades and the PCOR and to rinse/cool off after a few days of dispersed camping locally. This a nice lake to swim, paddle board, kayak, canoe and fish at. It has a decent day use parking area, boat launch and clean bathrooms if just passing through. An upper and lower campgrounds with plenty of spacious spots if staying longer. It can fit full size vehicles with campers or smaller trailers, overland vehicles with roof top tents, ground tents, hammocks etc.  Some spots can even fit multiple vehicles for RTT owners. It gets pretty packed during weekends but clears out by mid Sunday afternoon and would be a great pass through spot during mid week or early Thursday evening to snag a spot. Big loops for walking dogs on leash, small trail around lake and a dock for jumping in for a swim. Boat launch is for small boats maybe no more than 10-14 ft, canoes or kayaks. No motors. Will definitely be coming back to stay next summer for longer. 

https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/okawen/recarea/?recid=59107

The way up to the campsite was a bit rough, and as you’d think there is no service. But the campsite itself was very nice. I believe it was $12 a night and the campsite was pretty huge. The upper section was nice, but we stayed right by the lake in the lower area. Nobody actually stayed the night to camp with us over the 3 nights but a few people would come around between 11 and 5, but after or before that it was a beautiful lake to enjoy the day at. Overall great campsite, would visit again.

We came to this little gem of a campground from 6/22-25/2107. Based off our research, Black Pine CG had more use than we expected but we found a nice site (#23) away from the cluster of activity with a beautiful view of the mountains and lake. Even though the CG was almost full on the weekend, it was quiet (no loud or hooligan activity). There are two sections to the CG, upper and lower. We would have liked site #3 in the upper section if it had been available. There was quite a bit of day use activity at the lake with cars going in and of the campground beginning around 12:00 noon (weekdays and weekends).

The CG hosts were lovey. Lynn and Sherry keep the place spotless. Cleanest bathrooms ever! The camp supplied drinking water and there is plenty of firewood to be found. The pets on leash rule is strictly enforced.

Of course there were mosquitos but were only really bothersome at the usual morning and dusk time. It was not windy and overall was a beautiful and quiet CG.

We ventured down to the lake on day 2 and walked the short interpretive trail that goes about 1/2 way around the lake. Nice little trail and handicapped accessible. We only saw a couple of other folks on our walk.

There is active use for fishing from docks, kayaks, canoes, and rowboats. No motors allowed except for trolling motors but we never saw one. Discouraging site was the large brown trout in the garbage. Want and waste. Unfortunate.

In summary, Black Pine is a beautiful, peaceful, gem to enjoy and relax with easy access to trail heads in the area. We probably won't return because it was busier than we prefer. We're typically dispersed site campers but wanted to try out Black Pine Lake CG with our pop-up camper on this trip. It was an enjoyable location as we explore our new home state of Washington (transplants from Oregon).