Cape Perpetua Campground

Cape Perpetua

Cape Perpetua Campgound

Date Visited: Mid July 2012

Location: Along the Coast just south of Yachats

Type of Campground:  Forest Service

Reservations: Some sites can be reserved and some are first come first serve

Giant Spruce

Description: We chose this campground because we had not made any reservations ( which by the way I wouldn't probably do again-so stressful with 2 small kids).  We got there early Friday afternoon and had already checked out Tilicum, Rock Creek, and Washburne; nearby campgrounds and they were all full.  Cape Perpetua had a few empty sites but did fill up by the evening.  This campground is along a creek, in a beautiful forest.  None of the sites had hook-ups.  The sites ran along one side of the road so you had neighbors next to you but not across from you.  The bathrooms were extremely nice flush toilets. The sites were variable-some were very nice and big others were tiny probably for RVs and then some were rather slanted.  I didn't write down the numbers but I think 14 and 15 near the creek looked really nice.  There is also a large group campsite with a covered area and large field for tents. Several trails head out straight out from the campground which is awesome when you have a 1 year old who wakes up at the crack of dawn and you need to get out!  I will list some of the hikes below- you also can hike to to the beach, tidepools, and visitor center in the day use area. There were a few mosquitoes and of course we had the obligatory Oregon coastal rain the last morning but overall I really liked this campground-our site was not ideal-a little on the slanted side but the access to so much without having to get back into the car is awesome!

Pros: Lots of tent folks, campsites were only on one side of the road, hiking right from the campground (including to the beach, tidepools, and giant spruce), really nice bathrooms

Cons: Sites were small (most would be hard to fit more than one tent), some sites really really small, some sites were a bit slanty

Hikes Nearby:Giant Spruce, Tidepools (not ideal for really small kids), Beach, Spouting Horn,  the top of Cape Perpetua, Cummins Creek Wilderness and more.  Here is a map of the area. 

Tahkenitch Campground

Tahkenitch Campround

Date Visited: June 30,2012

Location:  Beach south of Florence

Type of Campground:  Forest Service

Reservations:  Before July:  Some sites can be reserved and the rest are first come first serve
Starting in July:  All sites are reservable (for the summer I assume)

Description:  We picked this campground near Florence because it was more of a tent camping campground with no hook-ups.  None of us had been here before so we randomly reserved some sites-paid the reservation fees and headed south.  When we arrived we found an almost empty campground- our reserved sites  were seriously crappy-tiny and bumpy.  We looked around and found some better sites and asked the camp host if we could switch.  Basically they had no idea what was going on but we took charge and moved anyways.  A few other bummers about this campground- a lot of the sites were tiny, the water was very rusty tasty, and brown so we had to fill our water in the bathroom, and then there were the mosquitoes.  We hadn't really considered the number of lakes in the area but the mosquitoes were everywhere making it difficult to do much hiking in the dunes or play outside.  Also camping at the beach in Oregon we found ourselves enjoying 18 hours straight of rain. Thank goodness for our fancy new rain shelter.  Some good things about this campground were the lack of RV campers and a trail head down through the dunes to beach starts right from the edge of the campground.  It is a beautiful but long trail-so it is a hike not a beach access.  I didn't write down any site numbers for reservation purposes since my brilliant blog idea came later.

Pros:  Trail access at campground, nice bathrooms, not crowded (but it was rainy and mosquitoey-so maybe people were just smarter than us:)

Cons: Mosquitoes, rusty water, weird hosts, some pretty bad tent sites

Activities/Hikes Nearby: Tahkenitch-Three Mile Trailhead,  Discovery Center in Reedsport