West Coast Campsite Availability

donkeydew wrote:
if you do it i would suggest a list of parks and start calling each morning before you get to far down the road. it is prime season and the coast is a magnet.
i live in the portland area and will not consider heading any where on the left coast without reservation in the summer

z2. We don't even go to the coast hardly in the summer. Too crowded. Hwy 101 is slow going. Tourists of all kinds all summer long. We much prefer going before Memorial Day and after Labor Day. Some of the best weather is in Sept/Oct.

Thanks for the tips. I can see the wisdom of calling ahead a bit to check availability.

djgarcia wrote:

Adiabatman wrote:
We're contemplating a trip from the DC to southern CA and then up the Pacific Coast to OR. We generally travel without reservations and I'm not too concerned about heading west. But I am worried that it might be difficult finding sites along the PCH in June. Any advice? Thanks.

fred

Your "no" reservations plan will result in the following possibilities:
1. severely limit/alter your RV park choices
2. add a level of anxiety or frustration during your travel as you wonder about your next day's reservations.
3. June will be the HIGH season for other tourists and local people who will impact your traveling and sight seeing activities.
The Calif. and Oregon coasts are high tourist attractions any time of the year but especially during the summer months. Reservations do not limit your RV travels or choices. Reservations are only plans to deviate from--You can cancell or change reservations!!!!

X2 to this!
Did the trip a couple of years ago. We were able to find spots, but it was a matter of researching/reserving a couple of days ahead, and be willing to either find State Parks that were inland and/or finding a private CG. Many is the place (public and private) we would check that was completely full. It was tight, and there were some high anxiety days where I was convinced we would just have to keep driving.....it also meant many times that if we found a spot, we might have to leave no matter what, as it was reserved for the coming weekend, etc. Not fun burning a couple of hours every day or three trying to find the next place we could stay.

BTW - we learned after the fact - travel North to South, if you can. There are sights you won't see being on the other side of the road, and many ocean side pull outs that you can't get to from the north bound lane.

Don't let others discourage you. When we hosted at Emma Wood in Ventura we usually had open sites during the week. Weekends may be booked up.

What is the down side to making a reservation ahead of time? Why wait? Or go ahead with no reservations and worse comes to worse you'll spend a bunch of nights in a Walmart parking lot with no air conditioning.

I also recommend reservations along the Oregon coast. State parks can be booked up to 9 months in advance and pretty much all the popular ones will be booked almost solid Memorial Day to Labor Day. You may find spots here and there, but will be limited.

As for wing_zealot's comment about Walmart parking, along the Oregon coast, there's maybe only a couple Walmarts, not too much in the way of commercialization over there. There may be private campgrounds that can be found, but space is still probably limited.

jeepgal wrote:
I also recommend reservations along the Oregon coast. State parks can be booked up to 9 months in advance and pretty much all the popular ones will be booked almost solid Memorial Day to Labor Day. You may find spots here and there, but will be limited.

As for wing_zealot's comment about Walmart parking, along the Oregon coast, there's maybe only a couple Walmarts, not too much in the way of commercialization over there. There may be private campgrounds that can be found, but space is still probably limited.

I don't think Hwy 1 has any WalMarts. :)

OP: You didn't state the size of your RV and if it's long there are sections of Hwy 1 PCH you do not want to be on. Take 101. Park it and use your vehicle to sitesee.

Also, Oregon's state parks on the coast, Cape Blanco at the southern end and Washburne near Florence do not even accept reservations. Plan to be there early the first part of the week and you'll get a site. We did. We love Cape Blanco - rough and wild!

We've also used other Oregon coastal parks without reservations. It can be done but you need to be there in the morning - Beverly Beach, Bullards Beach, Harris Beach, Fort Stevens. We find there are always cancellations.