Nehalem Bay State Park

This is a really special place with a phenomenal, easily accessible ocean beach and bay access but be warned: the campground is huge and the sites are small without a buffer zone of privacy between them. During our three night stay, the place was crowded with tents, Class A and Class C rigs, enormous fifth wheel trailers, camper trucks and boats. Our stay happened to coincide with a crabbing derby and there was a ton of activity everywhere. We stayed in B Loop on a weekend in mid-September when the campground was at full occupancy but we decided that we were going to make the best of it.

We ended up loving it, despite the sheer volume of people and extremely close quarters. We observed deer roaming the campground and grazing on a couple of separate occasions and saw several formations of migrating geese flying in off the water.

There’s an easy 1.8 mile paved loop through the forest that gives foot access to Nehalem Bay. The ocean beach is easily accessible by a short 2 or 3 minute walk through barrier dunes covered with coastal grasses. Saying the beach is picturesque is an understatement. I was lucky enough to catch whales blowing and breaching 150 yards or so off shore. That alone was worth the price of admission and being here on a busy weekend.

Sunday morning, the place cleared out so we had one partial, blissful day here in quiet and relative solitude. By the end of the day on Sunday, ALL of the sites in our area were full again but the activity was far more subdued.

Cell service was good, 3 bars with Verizon. We were able to stream a movie one night with no buffering, a rare treat! Our site had electric and water but no sewer. There’s a dump station on site with two stations.

This is such a special place; I would absolutely stay here again, despite the small sites and lack of privacy, but only during the week and in the off season, if this park has an off season.

We've recently discovered this place and already stayed here a couple times this year. Pretty standard as state parks go. This is a nice shady park off the beaten path with plenty of phone service. (Surprisingly) There's ample room for bike riding around the whole park. There's a couple well kept playgrounds, great for entertaining the children. There's also beach access from the park.

Nehalem Bay offers a few other activities that a lot of state parks do not. There's a large horse camp and access to a boat ramp within the park.

Some of the campgrounds on the coast have mosquito problems, this park is not one of them. That's a huge plus for us.

We will return to this park.

Large 900 acre State Park on the coast just south of the sleepy little beach town of Manzanita. Big campground area with hundreds of spots. Very seasonal. Excluding camp hosts (7!), only about half dozen campers were there on a weekday in December. $31/night partial hookups. No cheaper tent/dry camping rate. Relatively small sites. Clean restroom and showerhouse. Dump station, trash and recycling collection. Strong Verizon signal.
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Nice sandy beach extends 3 miles down the spit and makes for a great loop hike when paired with the horse trail. Was awesome to have miles of undeveloped coastline free of people to beachcomb and explore. Woke up to the local Elk herd grazing in the neighboring campsite. Even if you don't camp here, it's a great beach to hang out for the day.

The location is great and there's not a ton of choices in the area. But these spots are as close together as they can possibly be with no vegetation to break it up. We pulled in after sunset and left the next morning and didn't really feel like we missed out on anything by not staying longer. I could see it being a good base of operations for exploring things nearby, but not really a place to just hang out at the campsite all day

We stayed at Nehalem Bay State Park the middle of July 2018.

First off I want to say the staff at this park is AMAZING.

We arrived to a campground that was completely booked, busy season, just to find that an inconveniently placed tree, directly across the road from our reserved site, prevented us from backing in our fiver.

Convinced we would need to relocate, in an area that was booked everywhere, we stopped in at the check in station to let them know we were needing to forfeit our reservation and move down the road. Seemed like a casino or some other parking lot would be our only option.

We were kindly asked to wait a few minutes to speak with a park ranger so we did. Not only did the ranger find us an overflow site but he was also able to extend our reservation by one night. We were completely taken off guard by the hospitality and the willingness to go the extra mile to ensure we could remain in the park. Our personal THANKS to the staff at Nehalem Bay State Park.

This campground is a very well kept and beautiful Oregon State Park campground about a 5 minute walk to the beach from our site.

Oregon State Parks don't disappoint and this one is no exception.

Cell service is great from all 3 - Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile. We worked all week and streamed without our booster. We were a bit concerned that connectivity might be an issue simply due to the crowded park but it was fine.

There is a really nice 2 mile walking/biking path that loops the park. We saw deer and elk along this loop and it was one of our favorite features of the park

All-in all we loved our stay at Nehalem Bay State Park and will definitely look forward to a future stay.

Large, well-run state campground. Our section (D) was very quiet, with the soothing sounds of surf. Beautiful setting with trees and grassy sites. Paved, level sites, with ample room to accommodate and maneuver big rigs (35’ class A). Beautiful beach is a short walk through the grass-covered dunes. Easy 2-mile walk or bike ride into Manzanita.