National Park Campsites and reservations

[cpaharley2008]

Received an interesting letter and wanted to pass on their information to the members on the forum.
Hello again Jim,

To reintroduce myself, we met at the Escape Rally at the Riverside Campground in the Niagara region on September 16th. I had driven up from Massachusetts to check out the Escape models (we weren't able to be there with our 13' Scamp, unfortunately the 'boss' hasn't retired yet!).

I had mentioned I was going to look into the fees for national park campsites. Turns out there's one "reputable" site and then there's one that charges a 10% fee on your total bill!

RECREATION.GOV is the reputable site for making national park reservations:
https://www.recreation.gov/marketing...esPolicies.htm

NPS.GOV is the actual National Park site and this link gets you to Plan Your Visit page which includes info about campgrounds, etc.
https://www.nps.gov/planyourvisit/index.htm

The site that people complain about, that charges a 10% fee, is DECEPTIVELY labeled as 'nationalparkreservations'...this service is NOT affiliated with the NPS. They apparently own the domain name and actually will make actual reservations for you but for a fee...here's the link: https://www.nationalparkreservations..com/

You may want to look through these sites and see what actually shakes out for campground info.

It was a pleasure meeting all of the Escape community campers and everyone was so pleasant and inviting. Thanks to you all for being willing to let us all tramp through your homes!!!

And as there are no fiberglass camper showrooms anywhere, it was worth the 6 hour drive to see your campers in actual living conditions.

Thanks again and hopefully we'll be in a 21' fifth wheel in the near future...a year or so we think. Just have to get the boss retired!

Safe travels,
Michael (Mike) & Virginia (Ginny) Bilz

[Mike Magee]

Hmm, interesting. Never heard of that 'nationalparkreservations' dot com before. Clicking thru NPS.gov always takes one to recreation.gov for reservations. I guess this is one of the times in which google is not your friend, as it may lead folks into the wrong site.

[Raz]

Originally Posted by Mike Magee

Hmm, interesting. Never heard of that 'nationalparkreservations' dot com before. Clicking thru NPS.gov always takes one to recreation.gov for reservations. I guess this is one of the times in which google is not your friend, as it may lead folks into the wrong site.

And I thought Reserve America (they run Recreation.gov) were weasels.

[sokhapkin]

Originally Posted by Raz

And I thought Reserve America (they run Recreation.gov) were weasles.

Reserve America is running state parks reservation and has nothing to do with NPS which runs Recreation.gov

[Raz]

Originally Posted by sokhapkin

Reserve America is running state parks reservation and has nothing to do with NPS which runs Recreation.gov

Recreation.gov handles reservations for NPS, NFS, and the Army Corp. Campgrounds. Reserve America was awarded the contract to run Recreation.gov years ago (2006 I think). To the best of my knowledge they still do.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReserveAmerica

[Jerry Chapman]

I just checked out the website of https://www.nationalparkreservations.com. A very well designed website that makes lodging reservations at the gateway communities surrounding the parks. All I saw available were lodge and hotel rooms, etc. No campground information. It's hard for me to understand how someone could confuse the two websites. Basically it's room finder website, dedicated to areas surrounding the parks.

[k0wtz]

this reservations thing has turned into a giant rippoff. Mo is now setting aside whole sections reserverations only they get a kickback doing this I hate this stuff

bob

[Raz]

Many midwestern states have gone that route. South Dakota was the first we encountered two years ago. No people, no pipe safe, just a phone to call the reservation center. Last year we found the same thing at an Army Corp campgrounds in eastern Montana. This year, same story at an Army Corp. in the Allegany mountains. More common is the NFS campgrounds that used to be first come first serve are now reservable. They hire a concessioner to post the sites. Upon arrival you have to check the dates on the tags before you can set up.

[Byron Kinnaman]

My experience with National Parks and reservations is. The parks I've visited have very few NP campgrounds that take reservations, most of campgrounds within NPs that take reservations are privately owned or run. Yellowstone has 6 campgrounds that private(Yellowstone National Park Lodges)and take reservations and 7 that are run by the NPS. Death Valley has a 3 or 4 that are owned and run by Xanteria, One owned and run by NPS that takes reservations and at least 4 no reservations run by NPS. Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument has 2 campground both run by NPS and no reservations.
A few more NPS managed areas without reservations (some have private campgrounds that take reservations). Lake Mead Recreational Area, Big Bend NP, TX, Padre Island, TX. I'm sure there's more.


If you should ever plan on going to yellowstone here a link to their campgrounds.

[Terry in Fowler]

California left Reserve America and started handling their own reservation on August 1st. They also removed a large number of sites from first come first serve. The website is not phone browser friendly. I've given up each time and used the computer which is quick.
Note.
If you've been receiving any discounts it is necessary to get credit card type id. card before making discounted reservations or using them. They also cut the number of available days in half for this type of site.