Castaic Lake State Recreation Area

This place is super close to I5 but you don’t hear the traffic at all. I suppose when the weather gets warmer, it is much busier, but I’m the only camper in the B loop. I don’t know if I would stay more than a couple of days because there is no water, but for a night or 2 of dry camping, it’s perfect. There’s a dump station and coin operated showers. It’s 4 quarters for 3 minutes.

Check in and arrival were easy. The site was somewhat level and all dirt. There were a couple utility-style wood poles lying on the ground the separated sites. The best part was the view overlooking the Castaic Lagoon. The worst part was the trash at the campsite. It didn’t seem like there was much care provided; I had to keep my kids from picking up the old bottle caps lying around in the dirt, there was trash in the fire pit, and trash scattered around the surrounding foliage. It was good for a one-night stop, but I suppose I would’ve been picking up garbage if I were to make it a longer stay.

This place was horrible in every way. OK. The lake is beautiful, but it is closed to swimming and wading, and it is about 100 feet straight down from the "campsite." It's almost a straight drop down, so it is quite difficult to get to it, and much worse coming back up. The "campsite" is not really a campsite, but a parking space. Parallel parking. Against a curb! On the other side of the curb is dirt. Dry, dusty, blowing dirt! There is a fire pit, but fires are prohibited , so you cannot use it, just like you cannot use the lake. Across the street in the median strip are about 50 adolescent girls camping in half a dozen tents, on the DIRT, of course, because this is California and a drought and there is not a hint of grass anywhere. Cars are parked along the pot-holed street, up against a curb. The spaces are numbered and called "campsites." It's a joke. You could park in a nicer parking space anywhere in L.A. for free. This place charges $30. There are no park attendants. I reserved my "campsite" on line, and got a confirmation number. When I arrived the guard shack (and it was indeed a SHACK) was locked up. No attendant. Instructions to find your spot if you reserved, and if not, then show up at the shack in the morning to pay. Apparently there is an attendant only from 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. every day.

Seriously, this place is a joke. An extremely HIDEOUS joke. You are basically paying $30 to park on a street, next to dirt. I was not being facetious when I said to just find street parking in L.A. It would be nicer.

But then it got even WORSE! At 8:00 p.m. flood lights came on. I was in B 27, and there were two huge halogen lights high over B 29. They lit up the road like a baseball stadium. There are 20 people at the campsite next to me. There are about 50 adolescent girls on the median strip across from me. They are all squealing and giggling and screaming. In fairness, they are just being adolescent girls, but so are their so-called chaperones. It would have been nice if a park employee came around and asked them politely to be a little considerate of the other campers, but even though it was a Saturday night, there was nobody from the park on duty.
I swear, Walmart parking lots are elegant compared to this sh*thole! And WalMart is FREE.
Find another spot. This one sucks big time.

We stayed here after our Passport America stint was up at another nearby park. I wish we had stayed here for the entire week, though. It is very peaceful and the lake views are nice. We stayed in C17 which is at the very end of the C loop. It's the largest site and faces the lake. It was not even close to level but we managed using all of our blocks.

There are no hookups and the bathrooms aren't that great. They're clean but the toilet stalls had no doors. The showers were private but were $1 for 3 minutes. The water was HOT, though, so there's that.

There is a dump station with potable water (a previous review said there wasn't but there is now). Town is just a quick drive away. Mostly truck stops and fast food but bigger stores are close enough to drive to for groceries and such.

The entire place was clean and trash cans at every site. The park empties them daily. Beware of the squirrels.. some are fearless. LOL

We'll definitely stay here again if we're in the area.

This place is a really nice little relaxing spot.

One minor drawback...I called on the phone and was told they had potable water. So, I drove out from LA with the intentions of dumping my tanks and filling up my fresh water tanks with water.

No such luck they have water fountain type spickets, but no way to fill an RV even though they do have a dump station on the property.

We found ourselves pulling in after dark and searching for a site. At the 3rd loop (Lot C) we found a place lakeside and late that night realized we were next to a singing/chanting girl scout group. By 10pm all was quiet and it was not a problem.

The sites are tight in loop C and we were a little big for our site. In fact we hit a picnic table while pulling in in the dark. Luckily we could pick the table up and move it and no permeant damage was done to either the table, the RV or either spouse.

Sites are not level, each contains a fire pit, picnic table and garbage can. We had an issue with fearless squirrels nibbling on anything we left outside - even the grill (who knew that metal was tasty).

The lake is so low there is no launching or swimming directly in front of the sites. You will need to drive or bike around to the beach area for access.

We enjoyed the area and found it not too far from stores for resupply and a nice break after going over the Grapevine.