Deerlodge Park Campground

The biggest issue I have with this campground is that you don’t get that cool, soothing breeze when you use the vault toilets. I always enjoy that.

Otherwise, and noting that this is really a campground intended for tents, this place is a gem. I went 4 stars simply because there is a significantly better campground in this park that is not yet on Campendium. So if that campground is a 5, this can only be a 4 max. It’s simple trigonometry, if I remember my high school math. Which I don’t.

The river was a highlight, slow moving, with a plentitude of sandy beach in August of 2020, and did I mention that when the wind kicks up it is equally scary and cooling, an invaluable sensation in this corner of Colorado which is surprisingly hotter than even Southwestern CO. Sometimes nature doesn’t know what it’s doing.

If you have an RV, there is apparently no issue with camping in the parking lot. We did so in our van, at spot 5, but didn’t really use the picnic table setup as we were happy with our own trappings. Cottonwoods loom overhead like angels bathing you in shade, perhaps as close to being Cleopatra fanned by palm fronds as those non-goddess-queens of us will ever experience.

The drive in is exquisite ranch land, more satisfying than the drive into the park from Dinosaur and less crowded than the Utah side.

No hookups. Cell service enough for me to work. Filled up by evening but emptied out every morning. Never saw a ranger, but two tent camping scientists were there trying to read the dirt.

We were here September 25, 2019 and were the only ones there. The campground is the launch site for rafting the Yampa River, but the river is unnavigable after the spring runoff, so rafting season may be over by mid-June. I would hesitate to take an RV in during the season, but late summer and fall should be fine for anything quite small. It’s basically a launch site & turnaround area for boat trailers plus a gravel area to park next to each walk-in tent site. There was just enough room for our 18’ trailer in front of each site.
Then the rest of the area is a huge lovely old cottonwood grove with the wide river curving around it.
The road in is paved. $10 during rafting season, then $6. Water is turned off mid-July.
We loved the quiet, the beauty, and dark skies.