Buckhorn Recreation Area

Looking for an overnight stay while in route to central Ca. Found this campground on Campendium and decided to try it. What luck to find such a nice and peaceful place to stay the night. About 10 miles of I-5 but worth the drive on paved county roads. We were here in late Sept so the weather was perfect. No hook ups but water is near the campsite and a great view of the revisor. Nice bathrooms with a huge shower, but only cold water. Dead quite at night with a beautiful sunset. $10 a night with our senior pass but you have to pay through the reaction.gov web site. No cash drops at this campground. Can't go wrong with this place.
Oh and watch out for rattlesnakes as a previous poster commented. We found a baby rattler right behind our trailer in the morning before we left. Cute but deadly.

Spent a week here. 22’ camp trailer. Some campsites better than others. Used recreation.gov and had to reserve two spots for the days I was there. Limited campsites available. First few nights at #52. Close to water was nice. Vault toilet closed but no problem using trailer plumbing. Didn’t like how the table and fire pit were behind the trailer. Reserved #45 for the last half but upon walking over to check it out, discovered it was not a good site. Poor placement of table and fire pit and right next to bathroom/shower. Thankfully was able to get the last other available site #30. Not ideal, but better. Two level. Nice view of lake. Trailer parked right on road with slide out was nerve wracking. Table and fire pit below and accessed by a ramp.

Dump station was full when we left but the ranger let us use the dump station at the group camp area.

Otherwise the whole area in April was green, the lake full, and birds everywhere.

Will come back for sure and after scoping out all the ideal campsites, will make sure to reserve in advance.

The reservoir is very low, but it’s still beautiful out here.

The sites are a little deceiving from the photos. We though we had a pull through next to the table, but the pull thru is offset from the main camping area (not all of them are like this).

Wouldn’t recommend big rigs on the part of the loop we stayed on. Our spot was a little tight getting a sprinter out due to the road being destroyed on the side.

Watch for snakes. We ran into a big rattler out on the trails while biking. The ranger said they check for them in the camp weekly, but they said they are really really bad.

We arrived here after a disappointing experience at the stony gorge which was closed for no reason whatsoever. We did reservations online at rec.gov immediately when we arrived at the gate. We like the site so much that we reserved another night on the same day.

Plenty of room to walk and bike around. Clean installations. Multiple bathroom sites and also has a dump station if you need it.

Like all campgrounds you could hear noises but after quiet time (10 pm) it was really quiet. Overall great place for camping.

Great place to camp by the water... assuming there is water. The area is officially in a drought for 2021and the water level shows it. It's an easy drive in and amenities in the town of Orland right off the major freeway, so you can supply-up prior to arriving. The roads throughout the campsites may be narrow, so I'd be mindful for rigs longer than 35 feet or wide rigs. Read: Drive slow if you're at sites facing the water. The main road looks freshly paved, but the oneway roads throughout the campsites are old and narrow. Some sites are level, while others are not, but you can accommodate for it easily with blocks or whatever leveling system you have for an RV. Most sites have a platform for the campsite area that are level so there should be no issues with tents. That being said, it's an ACOE's campground, so overall they did a great job on the quality of the sites. The campsite is on a peninsula of sorts and are susceptible to the water levels. As noted, if the water is low, the peninsula will start to disappear as the water goes down on the East side. If there is water, it's a great place to SUP, swim, and fish, but bringing in a boat would be unwise as the water gets as low as a couple feet. There are plenty of trails to hike around these rolling hills. Quite a beautiful place to visit. We visited in May 2021 a bit early in the season. It was busy on the weekends, but I believe it's mostly because most people don't realize it's open. Because of this, I can see this place being very busy in the peak months. Also, I can see the weather being very hot during the Summer months. During our stay in Mid-May, it was in the mid-90's.

At arrival, we were not greeted by anyone, so we just went directly to our reserved site. Eventually, a friendly host came by to provide us the necessary tag to put on our site post and cars. The host did drive by a few times a day to check on things, including at quiet time hours. This does worry me of someone taking a reserved site, as there wasn't anything there to indicate we belonged there outside of the reservation confirmation we had. I say this, because there were a few people driving around looking for a site that didn't have reservations. I can see someone taking a reserved site, as there is nothing to indicate it's reserved. This would not be an issue if all site should be reserved.

There are bathrooms scattered around the campground, but I did not have the opportunity to visit them, as we have our own amenities in our trailer. We did get water from these areas and utilized the dump station when we left, but nothing else.

This is a big boating area where you can launch on the South side of the campground. A lot of people will park their boats on the shores of where they're camping, so j

Connectivity really depends on where you stay. If you're on the campsites by the water, signal diminishes a bit, but noticeably more for AT&T service. Otherwise, we got a solid 3-bars on Verizon, not boosted.

The only issue we had was other campers. Too much drinking, too much noise, but the host did a good job making sure after 10 pm everything was shut down. As with other campsites, other patrons can make or break whether you have a good time or not. In this case, it was not a big deal, but as noted, when the Summer months go on, I can see this being more of an issue, but not with our visit.

Overall, I would say this is a great place to visit. As of my visit (05/14/2021) the campground is open, but you need to make reservations on Recreation.gov.

We stayed here a few years back in late September. Wanted to get warm after being at Crater Lake and having a snow surprise! Randomly drove in and selected a site and we were the only ones in our loop! Nice ranger - pull thru site with a nice view. Yes the lake level was way down, but this is California... Great walking and a spot for the old black Lab to cool off in. Deer and gorgeous sunrise. I think the off-season here is perfect! Dry camping - our favorite. Restrooms and I think showers. A great place to just chill, watch the deer and birds from up on the bluff. Definitely a bit of a wander on narrow country roads - another reason we like having a small trailer!

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.