Pinnacles Campground

Pinnacles is an amazing park with great hiking.
The campground is situated among the bushes which offers some privacy. The bathrooms were clean. Only annoying thing was the campers who pulled up late and set up directly across from me and constantly shined their headlights directly into my camp, I couldn’t sleep and it totally blinded me! So rude.

I was here during winter and the road into the campground required driving across a stream - no biggie but in a rainstorm it could get crazy maybe.
Hiking here is so great. There was frost in the morning everywhere when I camped in late December. But I’ve hiked here many times in the spring and summer and it can get very hot!!! Watch for rattlesnakes!

December camping is iffy. Cold, but sunny. Hiking trails not overly crowded early in day, lots fill up in late morning. No shuttle in winter to trail heads. Condors, falcons and many moles and ground squirrels call this home. Bathrooms functional. Pay showers. Site reasonably level. Absolutely no AT&T or Verizon cell service whatsoever.

We absolutely loved the trails and the wildlife at Pinnacles National Park and would return in a minute to experience the dramatic condor-filled peaks and the fun caves. Unfortunately, the only realistic place to camp is within the park itself, on the eastern side, and for RVs the campground is in pretty bad shape. The one RV loop is basically a large sand lot, with little to define the sites other than utility posts. There is little shade or privacy between sites. The campground loop road is a dirt road and had many large and treacherous potholes at the time of our visit. Many of the RV sites were also closed because of danger that the few remaining trees in the campground might topple. There are also several tent camping loops, but those sites are almost uniformly too small to accommodate RVs. The one nice feature of the RV camping loop is that it has electric service, a rarity for national park campgrounds.

The bathhouse is in terrible shape. It is woefully undersized – one bathhouse serves all RV campers as well as day use visitors – and is located relatively far from the camping loop. There are toilets in some of the other camping loops (group camping, tent camping, etc.) but there are just four showers (2 for men and 2 for women) serving the entire campground. The bathhouse is in dire need of replacement, since the stalls are corroded away and don’t close, and the fixtures all drip. All in all, this was one of the worst national park campgrounds we’ve experienced because there is a tremendous amount of deferred maintenance.

The best aspects of the campground are the location (it’s the only game in town on the east side of the park), frequent visits by wildlife, and the ability to hike several of the park’s trails directly from the campground. We visited in the off-season, so with no neighbors and a virtually empty campground it was tolerable. We had site 120, which was one of the better sites for privacy (dense foliage behind it and the curb side faces a little-used driveway).

There is no signal to be had anywhere nearby on AT&T, though we did pick up several bars of LTE when hiking the High Peaks Trail.

The RV loop is small and some sites are better than others. We had site 89 which had a decent amount of privacy due to the site next to it being closed because of worries about falling trees. At least 3 sites were closed due to tree danger. The sites have electric only. There is a water fill station in the RV loop but the dump station is broken and it doesn’t look like it will be fixed any time soon.

The bathrooms are OK but the showers were dirty and there were not enough for the campground.

The location is great for visiting the park and you can see some wildlife (deer, turkeys, jackrabbits and condors). There are also raccoons that will try to steal your food. The bees were also troublesome.

This could be a much nicer campgrywith some overdue maintenance.

We had site 120, which was the last one in that row. Private, easy access to the Bench trail. Our 4 year old enjoyed the pool, our dogs enjoyed walking down the bench trail (until we hit the "no pets sign " half a mile later). Very hot in June, but evening walks were pleasant. Used the dump station on our way out. Enjoyed the 30amp electric to run our A/C during the day. Saw turkey vultures, deer, rabbits, hare, bats, quail, and bobcats.

The Pinnacles Campground has several loops with tent and group sites and one RV loop. The hook-up sites have 30amp electric and there is a dump and water fill up stations, but no sewer or water at individual sites. The sites are dirt/gravel and the RV loop has some serious pot holes so take it slow. There are mature trees that provide some shade, but no vegetation between sites for privacy. Overall the sites are pretty close together, those on the outside of the loop are a little roomier.

Each site has a firepit and picnic table. The restrooms/showers are a bit of a hike from the RV loop and were nothing to write home about. The real draw here is the location which bumps this campground to 4 stars in my book. The campground is located right next to the visitor’s center, which has a pool, showers and a small store. There are spotting scopes for viewing the condors and you can catch a shuttle to the Bear Gulch parking lot. It’s not required to take the shuttle, but parking is limited at the trailheads. There are also trails that leave right from the campground, but that adds several miles to your planned hike. And believe me the hikes are worth it!

The highway into the park is narrow and twisty, but still doable for bigger rigs.

We had absolutely no Verizon coverage here. We did manage to catch some 4G on the High Peaks Trail so take your phone along for the hike. 😊

I originally was going to stay in a standard site with my Class C RV and tow car. Even though the description made is sound like it would be long enough, a majority of the standard sites are too short for most RV's The standard sites are dirt/gravel and most are not level. The road through the standard sites is paved buy very narrow and windy. I did stay in the RV area where they have electricity hookups which was good since I was there during two very rainy days. It would have been chilly without it. The RV sites were long, gravel and pretty level. There were large potholes in the gravel road around the RV sites which bounce the RV around a bit. The RV sites are right next too each other and does not offer any privacy. There is no cell service. Another camper I talked with had purchased access to WiFi at the visitor center/store, but said it only worked intermittently. If you stay in the RV part and are not self contained it is a walk to the restrooms/showers. The showers looked fairly clean. There is only two in the women's bathroom, so I imagine it's busy in the summer. This park is way off the beaten path, but interesting, especially if you like to hike. To see the rock formations you have to hike a couple of miles.

Loved our stay at Pinnacles Campground. It was super hot while we were there, but no surprise for the middle of July. We lucked out with site #26 and it's huge oak tree that shaded our site. We brought 2 E-Z Ups and that was a great help. The pool was so refreshing, all the staff was very friendly, restrooms kept clean. The only thing, there was only one working shower. But things happen. Camp store and National Park bookstore were small but well stocked. They had everything we needed. There was water at our site.

Be sure and use the food boxes, not because of bears but the pesky raccoons. Neighbors left food on their table while they went for a walk. Raccoons raided their camp and left quite a mess. Ants were also a problem. There was alot of them. Just keep things super clean.

Would Recommend this park to anyone. It was great and the Pinnacles and Caves were Beautiful. .

This is a very beautiful park to go to. Go in the spring before the weather warms otherwise this will be very hot! Great and diverse types of hiking is available, so this place gets crowded in on the weekends. This is nice in that the shuttles run then so you do not have to drive to the main hiking trail heads.
Sites are nicely spaced but are compact dirt so leveling will be a must. It is a very pretty site. Also, there is NO cell phone coverage or TV :-) but there is radio.

Did have one problem, the circuit breaker kept popping at the main board and not at the pedestal so was a little perplexed the first time it happened.
Only electric hook is available but there is a spigot near by with threads so when you pull in you can fill your fresh water tank. The dump station is very nicely laid out.