Mazama Campground

We camped while there were some wild fires south of Crater Lake, so the view of the lake wasn't as clear. The campground was booked out, but because of the smoke few campers showed. Our site, F28, was large with a long pull through. The down side of this spot was that the hike-in camping sites were just across the street, so the night time noise was loud. And even though it's not allowed (national park), you could definitely smell pot coming from the hike-in campers. The campground itself is large with some really cool trails accessed from inside it. Annie's Creek trail was especially fun to hike, no driving to the trailhead needed. The rangers had some fun and interesting talks at the amphitheater in the evenings. The flush toilets were well maintained, showers were closed for the season. The little store, gift shop, and eatery are within walking distance from the campsites. Even with the smoke coverage of the lake, it was definitely a must visit. Lots of hiking options throughout the whole park with just a short drive. Make sure to pack away any food in the bear lockers provided in each campsite.

It's been quite an ordeal to find a campsite in this campground, but boy did it deliver. We got site #F1, which was quite spacious and expanded towards the back, a great feature if you have little kids. I would be careful on this site if your trailer is longer than 27 feet; it was easy to maneuver our 25 feet AirStream.
Our site didn't have any hookups, but there were many electrical hookups on the F loop. For the portable solar, you have to keep moving it until noon, as many trees are in the way, but it was ok afternoon; the site area in the back had constant sun till late during our stay in August.
The weather was medium to mild throughout our stay. The first couple of days, it went up in the high 80's during the day and high forties to low fifties at night. I had a couple of 12V fans, which came in handy. The generator hours are generous, from 8 AM to 8 PM. We try to keep generator use to a minimum, only use it to top off the battery after a daylong of solar use.
There is a Gas Station, but it only has 87 Octane, so if you need higher octane fuel or diesel, you will need to drive 30 minutes out to Hwy 97.
Cell signal is sparse to nothing; we could get one to two bars for AT&T and Verizon, near some campsites in the F-loop and on trails. There is also a signal in Rim Village. But the Camp Store has free WiFi and charging stations. Most people use that couple of times a day to connect back to the world they left behind. We enjoyed this opportunity to disconnect entirely for a few days.
There are lots of hikes of different difficulty levels to do here. The views of the lake are beyond stunning, we were while fires were going on in Oregon and California, so there was smoke making the lake views hazy; it was beautiful despite that.

Our park entrance fee normally $30 was waved because we had a Eagle Pass as well as our 50% discount for our camp site. But be aware you need to go to the village camp store and ask for your discount after paying online for your site and they will refund your discount amount.

Moreover at Mazama Village they assign you your camp site - there is no choosing! If you booked more than two or three-night, this can be a problem. There are only a very few sites with power in section B and C. I saw large 5th wheels crammed into difficult and small site, and tiny teardrops in giant site - all assigned. It's a crap shoot! Our site was D1 where the picnic table, fire ring and Bear food locker was all on the wrong side of our trailer. So if you get any site with an odd numbered 1,3,5,7,9 and so on you will have the same issue. Only saving grace was the fact it was close to all the lake activities and the rim drive. Plus the gas station was cheaper than the outside gas price by .25 cents a gallon.NO diesel fuel only regular unleaded gas.

We stayed here several years ago - were meeting up with friends so needed a central spot. Checking in was weird... we left our credit card info on file and they sent us out with a map and let us pick. Different colors on the signposts indicated amenities and price. We just grabbed a pull-thru with another pull-thru behind us and left a note for our friends so when they came in they could find us. Beautiful campground - decent sites, a bit tight getting out with rocks & trees and we have a 19' Rpod... No cell coverage except for when we got on the trail on the N side of the campground. We showered in our trailer, but our friends said very hot showers were available (again this was a few years ago). This is a great place to base from - watch the weather - we got snowed on in September!

We requested electrical hookup, but got a site without any hookup. The site is very spacious and not close to each other. Each site has its own fire ring and it's very nice to have campfire at night. Shower is closed due to Covid-19 but restroom is open. The site is super quiet at night. You won't be able to get any phone signal at campsite. We got a bit signal when we did the rimdrive in certain spot.

The rv sites are on the outside loop, on a one-way counterclockwise drive. That places the rv entrances on the road with picnic areas on the opposite side of the vehicle. We saw a few unsuccessful efforts to reverse an rv! The sites themselves are very nice, with fire pits and picnic tables, but painfully close to other campers. We could easily have participated in our neighbors’ conversations with the exception of the one running a generator.
Our $32 nightly rate was refunded by 50% due to a Senior National Park pass.

If you are a hiker or bicyclist and want to explore Crater Lake NP, the location is great! If you are in/on a motor vehicle, however, there are much better campgrounds within a 30 mile radius and the extra drive is well worth it to avoid the pitfalls of this campground.

The concessions vendor for this campground (Aramark) is horrible. They will only let you check in for 1 day at a time! You have to wait in line at noon every day to check in for you next night's stay. So that severely limits your sightseeing time. When we came back after our first night's stay about 11:30 am to pick up our trailer and go somewhere much, much better, we observed a line around the building waiting to check in.

We checked Thursday evening about 4:00 PM and there was no wait. I told the counter person we had a 20' travel trailer. He assigned us a pull through spot (and I believe all the spots there are pull through), but it was on the left side of the road! Now, I should have spotted this error by looking on the map, but if you are familiar with travel trailers at all you would know that this would put your door facing the road and your campsite on the backside of your trailer! The loop was tight, and we ended up with trees just inches from the right side of our trailer....the side where you awning extends and your door is.

This campground has a horrible black dirt/pine needle ground covering that sticks to EVERYTHING! And if it rains, like during our visit, the rain will kick this messy stuff up to cover EVERYTHING within a foot of the ground. We put down a welcome mat and within 3 or 4 trips in and out of the trailer, the mat was completely saturated with the black goo and it was invading the trailer. I have a 5 gallon collapsible water bag that I use to fill the trailer's fresh water tank and setting it down on the ground to connect the hose resulted in about 3/4 of the water bag getting covered in the black dirk/pine needle mixture.

I have no idea about the cleanliness of the bathrooms/showers. The black dirt made us not want to step foot outside our trailer. There was one item of trash left in our camping spot from the previous camper that I picked up and disposed of.

The pros:
*Close to the loop drive around Crater Lake rim. But so is Lost Creek campground on The Pinnacles Road, and if you were tent camping, I would suggest there. If you are sightseeing in a motor vehicle, stay about 30 miles away at Diamond Lake. You won't have to go back at noon to check in every day.
*Quiet. Very Quiet. Almost silent. Especially about 11 AM when everyone has to leave to go check in for the next night!

Cons:
Tiny campsites.
The dirt. The dirt. The dirt. EVERYWHERE and on EVERYTHING!
Horrible management.

One last thing. Quiet hours are from 10 PM to 7 AM (as usual). But don't run your nearly silent suitcase generator past 8 PM. You'll get a banging on your door about 8:20 PM and open it to find the National Park Service SWAT team there (2 SUVs, 2 park rangers each, with blaring lights on the lead SUV) to tell you that you are piratically a felon for running your generator past 8 PM! She even insisted on collecting my driver's license to run a check on me! Yes, I know (now) it is in the written regulations, no generators between 8 and 8. But I would think a simple knock and a friendly reminder of the regulations would have been more in order rather a full-blown felony type police action.

Let me start by saying this is a nice enough campground. The sites are close, but not stacked right on top of each other. It is convenient to the main attraction, only 7 miles from the lake and accompanying visitor center. The problem is, the new concessionaire is completely incompetent who has unnecessarily complicated which should normally be a simple procedure. First, don't bother even trying to book a site online, the link provided is ONLY for reserving a room at the inn. You have to call. When you do, you get a site, but you can't pick one. It will be assigned to you when you check in. And, you can't book a site with hookups. You can request one when you check in, and hope that one is still available.
As for "walk-ins" here is where it gets REALLY frustrating. What is normally a simple process at a park service location becomes a maddeningly frustrating experience! When you arrive, you get in a line at the side door, and wait. And wait. AND wait some more. They claim they start processing people at noon, but it was more like 12:45. Campers are processed two at a time, explained the regulations and procedures, and assigned a site based upon their particular needs. There are three choices; tent sites, 28 or 55 foot rv sites. No hookups are allowed to walk-ins. When they run out of tent sites, tent campers take rv sites. You can only get the site for ONE night. If you plan on staying more, you must repeat the ordeal again (and again, and again). One reason is, although the website SAYS 25% of sites are kept for walk-ins (LIKE EVERY OTHER NATIONAL PARK CAMPGROUND). this is false. So I got there on Thursday, got a site, but on Friday (labor day weekend) they only had 18 sites available. I was #19 in line. It took them TWO and a HALF HOURS to process 18 people !! They told me there were several alternative campgrounds just outside the park, but they were out of the printed handouts showing where they are. Even more frustrating, they invited me to come back on Saturday and try again, when they had...…...SIX sites available !!!! Didn't bother. As I had spent 26 hours in the campground (four of them standing in line in the 90 degree sunshine) I had had enough. I went up to Rim Village to see the crater and the museum, went down the East Rim Drive to an overlook and a waterfall, stopped at the lower visitor center to hike a short trail and see a video (nothing else to do there, it is basically a gift shop), and headed out. The Williamson River Forest Service Campground down on 97 was less than half full, was actually nicer than Mazama (without flush toilets, of course) for $5 a night ! Aramark should stick to selling $8 hot dogs to drunks at Fenway Park, they don't have a clue about campgrounds management.