Buckhorn Recreation Area

I've had my eye on this campground for a while - looking at the Campendium reviews and Youtube videos. I like the California setting - grasslands and oaks. Lots of pretty wildflowers this time of year.

We were here in mid March 2020 and some of the loops were closed, but there were only 4 of us campers. Many of the sites are short back-ins. Many are also pull-throughs where you basically just set up and park along-side the road through the campground.

There is easy access of highway 5 and only a short drive on the 2 lane road from Orland to the campground. Using Google maps from our home near Santa Rosa, the driving time was posted as about 3 hours and 15 minutes, but it took us 4.

I had no idea from the websites I'd seen about the extensive boating access. There is a large parking lot and ramp below the campground.

This place was decent, but not great. We came in through Corning, but left through Orland. The road out was MUCH better! If you’re headed south, it’s worth the extra drive to Orland and then in. We used a Federal Pass and paid half price. The spots are not particularly level. The bathrooms were okay and there is a shower. My biggest gripe is the other camper who ran his commercial generator until sometime after 10:30 and then started it up again at 6:30 this morning. Beautiful sunrise, though.

Stayed here 2 nights in January. Park was clean and had beautiful views of the reservoir. No issues getting a 36ft Super C around, though sites will take some effort to get level. Absolutely quiet at night with great views of the stars. Has fresh water fill up and black tank dumps as well. Our only complaint were the people who ran their generators from 8am-10pm, but I won’t ding the campground for that (they left by our 2nd day). Get up here when there aren’t a ton of people and it’s awesome!

I was here in early December, so it was empty. There were a total of about four other parties there. Talk about peaceful! And I actually caught fish, icing on the cake. There are numerous day activities there, and there's a nice five mile loop to hike or bike, just westof the CG. I was in site #35 and got decent Verizon reception. I can't remember if I got Sprint service...I don't think so. Even though it was deserted, the showers had hot water! The host Dave and local Ranger Amber were really nice.

Let me preface by saying I work from the road, so Internet/cell service is crucial. When I pulled in to this campground, the camp host (Beebs) was super kind and helpful, but she was not optimistic about cell coverage on T-Mobile. Since I was coming off a night Boondocking in Walmart after a disappointing trip to Stony Gorge, I wanted to give the campground a shot so I drove through to assess.

I drove every loop until I arrived at the very top of a short but steep hill, all the time monitoring the cell strength. When I crested the hill at site 65, my gauge went green! This is the only site in the campground that I could get reliable signal, so I booked 4 nights.

It’s a fairly large campground, some sites very close to the water and some quite a bit above. They seem to have everything I needed and then some - nice clean showers/bathrooms, lots of water sport options, water spigots (not hookups, you gotta Sherpa the water if you need it), a dump station, great road surfaces, and best of all, not crowded at all.

I’d highly recommend this place, and will be back. Unfortunately, Beebs told me they do not honor the America the Beautiful passes anymore - no discounts. Max stay 14 days.

You’ll like it here.

Friends found this lake so we joined them for the weekend (we live about 3 hours away), making reservations online so we could camp near them and make sure we had a site big enough for our 32' TT. We reserved site 50 as it was specified it was a 57' long (back-in) and on the lake.
Upon our arrival, after negotiating a tight and sloped turn, we realized there was NO WAY we were going to be able to level our trailer in our original site so back up to the guard shack to choose another site, 56, which was long enough and fairly easy to get into. Our friends have a 40' Montana fifth wheel and chose site 48, which was very dicey getting in (curved pull-through) but they did it! This recreation area has several loops, with sites 1-22 being the most level of the entire campground. Another friend (37' Winnebago MH) ended up in site 8 with plenty of room and gorgeous views of the lake.
Overall, a great campground with beautiful views of the lake but the water level drops throughout the summer and it gets HOT (we were here in early May)! Very peaceful mid-week and busy on the weekends, although not every site was full the weekend we were there. Great kayaking and fishing on this part of the lake (5 mph zone so few, if any, boats).
There are showers and bathrooms (including pit toilers), although showers are not near most of the campsites.

What a pleasant surprise! The Buckhorn campground on the Black Butte Reservoir is managed by the Army Corps of Engineers. There are 3 separate camping loops that cozy up to the main body or arms of the reservoir about 13 miles northeast of I-5 from Orland California.

We visited in February and only the south loop was open on a first-come, first-served basis. The mostly level and paved sites sit on a hill overlooking the reservoir and many have either a water view or a view of Mt. Lassen and surrounding mountains to the east. There are no hook-ups but water is available and there are flush toilets and showers. There is an RV dump available. The pull-through sites would handle very big rigs. We chose a back-in site and were able to leave our 21 foot (overall) trailer connected to the truck. The sites were nicely spaced as well although the lack of foliage means there's little privacy.

If fishing is your thing there's a boat launch and reports of great fishing. We saw/heard tons of birds and watched a small herd of deer that was enjoying the new grass growing near the campground. Other campers told us that winter and spring are the best time to visit because it gets hot and crowded in the summer months.

We got 3 bars of Verizon 4g service. Nightly rate is $20 but federal passes are accepted.

update. We went back to Buckhorn after upgrading from a 21 foot trailer to a 30 foot fifth wheel. We still loved it but be advised, tall 5th wheel like ours (13’ 4”) may scrape very hard oak branches in many sites. There were only 2-3 sites we could get into without risking roof penetration. Since we went back in February I can’t say if the other loops have the same problem.