Cougar Rock Campground

Cougar Rock Campground is THE spot to stay for access to the Paradise/Longmire areas of Mount Rainier National Park. The sites are rather small and uneven, but this is driven by the topography of the landscape. Choose your site carefully to ensure your equipment will fit. Also note that these are primitive sites - no hookups. Most sites have shade due to the numerous trees, so solar collection can be spotty.

The campground hosts in 2021 do a fantastic job of welcoming visitors and keeping things organized. The bathrooms feature running water and flush toilets, with potable water stations outside each location. I had poor to no cell service at the campground, but drive up to the Henry M. Jackson Memorial Visitor's Center at Paradise for a very robust signal (Verizon LTE 4 bars).

You're a short (15-20 minute) from the Paradise area and some of the best hiking trails and scenery in the park. Enjoy!

Standard issue national park camp ground. Lots of sites closed this season due to hazard trees.
Would not stay here again because our child's toy bin was pilfered through and items were stolen while we were out hiking. Reported to the rangers and it's apparent that theft is an issue in this area. Later noticed placards in bathrooms telling people to keep valuables in their vehicle trunks.

This was the first campsite that we stayed at to facilitate my niece and her hubby to walk the Wonderland Trail in three days. We ended up getting a campsite two spots away from them we had no reservations but it happened to be opened. What a blessing. So we parked our revel and left early in the morning to drive up to Mowich. they had a great bathroom and a place to wash up your dishes if you needed to and a recyclable area and trash. It was pretty quiet lots of places to camp and it was very full. Definitely need a reservation or you end up winging it.

First come, first served, but early in June there were dozens of sites available. A lot of great sites, with plenty of semi-private sites where the fire-ring / tent pitch is several yards away from the parking spot, back in the forest. The automatic payment station in the front was tremendously convenient, as were the water bottle fill up stations. When the weather cleared, the view of Mt. Rainier from the campground roads was tremendous. A very nice dish washing station to boot.

Cougar Rock is a large campground (and the one closest to Paradise) with over 170 sites in six loops. Note that the maximum allowable length for motorhomes is 35 feet and 27 feet for trailers and 5th wheels. Loops A and E have some sites that are right on the road. Some sites are pull-through and most are spacious with varying amounts of privacy between them. C1 felt very private, even though it was the first site in the C loop. Each site has a fire ring, picnic table, and bear box. You can hear the Nisqually River lull you to sleep. Don’t forget to bring your towel to the bathroom as there are no paper towels or air dryers in the bathrooms. The bathroom was reasonably clean but as with all NPS campgrounds, there are no showers. Cougar Rock was a very quiet campground on a Monday in mid-June, even though there were a fair amount of people camping. The campground opened in May; the sites are reservable June 21-September 3 only. If you haven’t reserved a site (and therefore pre-paid), there is a machine that accepts coins and credit cards (but not bills that I could see!) to pay for your campsite. The Wonderland trail is accessible from the campground, but you would have to drive to other trailheads. We are told you can get a great view of Mt. Rainier just across the street on the trail, but we will have to take the ranger’s word on it as the clouds completely obscured the view! No cell service.

We like this campground for its convenience. You’re inside Mt. Rainier NP and can skip the entrance lines and get to Paradise while there’s still parking. We brought our truck camper because this campground can’t handle trailers longer than 27 feet or motorhomes longer than 35 feet. Not only are most of the campsites too small for bigger rigs but many are poorly angled, too unlevel or have low tree branches above and beside narrow driveways. Frankly our no-slide truck camper would have problems with many of the sites. As we left we witnessed a moderate sized Airstream struggle to exit the RV dump station because there’s a tight loop with raised curbs and tree branches growing into the drive. Medium size rigs will want to scope D loop before driving it. There’s a tight corner at the far end of the loop that squeezes between 2 large trees.

The campground is set in a beautiful forest near the Nisqually River. The river provides enough white noise that you hardly hear the main park road nearby. There is a peek-a-boo view of the mountain from the main campground road. There are 5 loops (A through E) plus ‘R’ sites along the main campground road. Campsites in A loop and the R sites are first-come first-serve sites. E loop is no generators. The campground filled up each day we were there in late July.

The facilities are NPS rustic. Bathrooms with flush toilets and cold water faucets. No showers or hand dryers. Near the bathrooms are water faucets for filling bottles and sinks for dumping gray water from tent camper kitchens. There is a nightly Ranger and a Junior Ranger program from late June through Labor Day.

We had no (Verizon) cell service at all. The nearest reliable cell signal is in Ashford, about 30 minutes away from the campground outside the parks southwest border.

We really loved this campground for the size and privacy of its spots. Although most of the sites are made for tent camping, there are a few pull through RV spots with a max length of 27ft (and they mean it). It's in a heavily wooded area and a short walk to some great trails in the park. There are no hookups, but they do have generator hours and sell wood on site for campfires.