Pinnacles Campground

We had so much fun at Pinnacles National Park. Being in a cabin instead of a tent was great, especially when the rain poured down on us. Unfortunately we were not quite ready for the cold weather at night but that’s on us. Always Be Prepared!!! We took the Bear Gulch trail which was amazing and saw a lot of wildlife. Would love to come back!

While this national park is somewhat remote, there were some great trails, caves and landscapes to view. The caves were fun! Be sure to see both the east and west sides of the park. We were there mid-April and the weather was good for hiking. We have a small camper and fit into most of the campsites available. On the west side entrance, you cannot tow a trailer into the park because of narrow roads, so plan accordingly.

The campground seems to have gone downhill since the last time we were here. Must be due to the cutbacks that have been enacted by the recent administration.

Some of the campsites are nice and spread out but not all.

Great park, great upkeep, beautiful hikes

Clean campground totally immersed in nature; tons of wildlife and beautiful flora. Watch out for the raccoons!

Generally good experience. Had issues with power not staying on, so we dry camped. Other than that, we had a great couple of days hikes.

I think better facilities are needed at Pinnacles N.P. campground (which is difficult to do with budgets being cut back). Either the company running the campground, or a ranger needs to patrol the campground once in a while to see if campers have any problems, or to answer questions. Maybe even a camp host (I didn't see any).

Given the price of these sites, I would expect a higher quality experience. Within the portion of the campground where our site was located, portable toilets were the nearest option for bathrooms. During the critical morning hours, there was no toilet paper in one of the bathroom stalls in the campground. The one time I took a shower there was also no soap left. The roads within the campground are also poorly signed and designed. Essentially every road is one lane; however, one some of the roads are signed as such and they are not signed consistently or clearly.

We thought Pinnacles was a fine campground. We were in 72C, which didn't have much shade throughout the day, so that could have been a problem. However, we weren't in our tent then. The water spigot was right across from our campsite--very convenient. The site is at the bottom of a large hill with lots of trees, so shade does come eventually. It was colder in the morning, though, because the sun didn't hit our campsite till about 9 a.m.

One of us used the shower facilities, which has plenty of hot water. The only issue is that there is no light over the shower stalls, so it was a bit dark.

We were fairly screened from our neighbors by trees and shrubs, and we found a nice, fairly flat spot to pitch our tent (a 3-person). It was quiet at night and we got to hear wild turkeys, woodpeckers, frogs and other wildlife.

Loop C only has porta potties, and they were pretty full from a busy weekend (we went Sunday through Tuesday). Kind of gross, but they did the trick.

Our one complaint is that if you were in loop C, especially on the end where we were, it was a long walk back toward the camp store to get to the Bench trail which then required another 1.5 mile walk to even get to the start of the main hiking trails.

The camp store was great. It even had microwave popcorn--a real treat for me!