Jefferson County Fairgrounds

This place hasn't had covid homeless since early 2021. The electric has been renovated and the 32acres of fairgrounds are pretty special. It's a hidden gem. We stayed while Fiddle Tunes was happening at Fort Worden just a short walk away and Fiddle music was a backdrop to our stay. You can safely dismiss the bad situation of the past. Our family will be back.

A group of friends and I stayed here first of August and there were tents of homeless in back along with immobile campers and people stealing power with extension cords. We were told then that they couldn’t evict because of covid by court order. Now (end of September) there are twice as many. Tent compounds on individual sites with scattered possessions all out in rain and weather. One site had wooden pallets to camp on. The front row has 30amp I think everything else with power is only 20 amp and very antiquated. This is a shit show to say the least. I wouldn’t plan on using the bath house if you’re worried about covid how can they even begin to keep these sanitary? Please don’t mistake this for lack of empathy, I just wish the city council could come up with a better solution for their homeless. I understand people need a safe place to stay but this isn’t the right solution! photos posted here are definitely from better times. You may get phone service and text but internet is mostly nonexistent

We had just come off the Ferry and needed a place for a few nights. Our parking place was level and we could reach 30 A and water, but to get them we had to park on the parking lot next to site 18 which was unoccupied. Almost all sites need LOTS of leveling side-to-side. The whole place is on a hillside. There were some FH sites, some water & elect, but with Covid spacing they were full. Seemed like mostly long term campers, many in tents and cars, etc along a fence line away from the utility sites. We didn't use the restroom/showers, but all the non-self contained (most of the campers there) used them a LOT. There didn't seem to be very much TLC given to the campground. There seemed to be a handful of travelers/vacationers and the rest would fall into the category another reviewer used, "Sketchy."

I have been staying here for the past couple of months while rotating in and out of the 14 day limit at Point Hudson. I have to say, it's really declining quickly. Colder weather seems to be bringing in a lot of people living in their cars, which would not otherwise be a problem were it not for their foul language and boom box music that blares from the trunks of their cars.

But the really troubling part is the shower house. I couldn't figure out how one campground could accumulate so many "hair cookies" in the showers, and empty soap and shampoo containers. After all, the campground is 75% empty at this time of the year. Most of what is left is big rigs with sewer hook-ups, so how are the showers getting so much abuse?

Then I started watching...most of the people that park here in cars are only here for a few hours, long enough to use the showers. The campground allows non-campers to shower here for a $2.00 fee. This appears to be what is raising the sketchy-factor, in my opinion. Don't come here expecting to feel good after a shower...

We stayed here on Labor Day weekend. The "campground" is an open field with shared utilitiy posts. Grassy/dirt sites extremely unlevel. It was my fault as we read the information at the self-check-in board we found sites 2-18 listed as having water, electric, and sewer. We chose #14 and went ahead to set up. It took a few tries to get level, but once level we sped through the set up, pop-out, etc. procedure, only to find out when I attempted to plug in to the electric, the only electric was a 110 outlet, which they failed to fully describe at the check-in info. Instead of loading up and relocating to one of the cheaper W/S sites, we ate the $5 per night difference and stayed at #14 (it's great to have 8 145W solar panels for boondocking when you need it). The sites are stacked like cord wood, with skinny lanes between rows to make maneuvering a 40' bus a bit of an exercise. There are only a few picnic tables scattered among the sites, ours had none. No amenities (fire pit, patio, playground, etc.), just a field with some hook-ups but still a good base camp for the area if you do not plan to spend other than sleep time at the campground. There is a bit of a primitive shower/bath house, but it was clean. The price is the only incentive for us to stay here again. It appears there are several rigs here that are long term residents. The fairgrounds is at the outskirts of town in a bit of a run down section of town.

First oh all, thanks Watson Wanders for the heads up on odd parking arrangement in the W/E section . 4 rigs share a pedestal and section between rows is narrow. You could get trapped in your site if a combination of long vehicles were here and it was busy. Luckily we read their review and parked on the end.
No frills but close to Downtown Port Townsend. We didn’t use any facilities here except W/E. Internet fluctuates between 1 & 2 bars Verizon

Port Townsend is a busy little town and if are like us and didn't make a reservation at the state park or marina a year in advance, the fairgrounds are your best option. While not the most scenic location, we found it perfectly adequate and would not hesitate to return.

As other reviewers have mentioned, the site layout is strange and parking in the middle rows could result in you never getting back out. We parked in the first row and did not have any issues. The hook-up situation does leave a little to be desired as our water pipe was busted and we had to use our neighbor's connection to fill our tank a couple times throughout the week. The 20 amp power connection was not an issue for us as it was September and the thought of using our AC was laughable. Despite these issues, you really can't beat the $25 per night price for full hook-ups.

Finally, the location of the fairgrounds is what makes it so desirable. Only a short bike ride from the state park, a quick drive (or ride) into town, and right next to an extensive network of walking trails.

The Verizon signal was unusable, but AT&T was rocking it was 4 strong bars of LTE.

First off if you can plan ahead as was already mentioned, do it. The sites in the middle of the park are very close together and if it got full it would be very difficult to get a rig in or out. We parked on the last row with Power & Water and got in and out reasonably well. And yeah, it was only 20 Amps. If it would have been summer and we wanted to run our AC we would probably be out of luck. I can see it kicking out the breakers. The bathrooms were, IMHO, not filthy but definitely not spotless and not state of the art. I would have used the showers if I had needed to but I have a high tolerance. But we are self contained so we didn't have to use the facility and there is a dump station on site. We also only had 1 bar of Verizon but I have a Netgear MIMO antenna for my little Ellipsis MiFi and with it pointing north was able to get 3 bars and stream video and surf the net. Now some good things. It was very nice and quiet. Easy to get to from my home in Seattle. The grounds were clean and plenty of space to walk the dogs. Getting into town was so easy but parking can be a real drag; specially if you are driving your tow vehicle. I can really see the benefit of a Towed in this situation. If you do get there I can recommend the Silverwind for dinner ($$) and Elevated Ice Creme for dessert.

Convenient to Port Townsend and only a short walk to Fort Walton Park, this fairground camp ground was very disappointing. There are five rows with 7-10 sites per row. The first two rows are power/water/sewer (but only 6 of these sites had 30amp, the rest were 20amp) these are $25 per night; the second two rows are 20amp/water (@20 per night); the last row is dry camping (@$17 per night). There is a self-pay station and they accept personal checks (US and Canada). Note: there is a 10-day maximum stay; you have to leave for 48 hours but can come back and stay another 10 days.

The bathrooms were rather dirty, with overflowing trash cans, and one of the three showers (in the women’s room) was out of order. There was an underground leak that assured a small pond was always available next to our car. The internet signal was very weak; we have Verizon and had only one bar.

On the bright side, this location is only 10 minutes from the car & Big Rig ferry over to Whidbey Island.