Ausable River Camping

The site deserves 4 stars and was great. But mother nature almost got the best of us. 90°+ heat followed by thick smoke from Canada's forest fires. This area of the Ausable River is beautiful.

Was an amazing site that was very secluded and peaceful. Steep hill down to river, like other reviews stated. (learned not to try wearing crocs while going down. lol) Came in handy to have a spot to just sit in the water due to it being very hot the few days I was there. Paid for that with getting swimmers itch, though. Will certainly stay at that site again.

Great process for reserving.

Great reservation process. We did not use our reservation. We had to end our trip early due to the smoke.

Didn't end up staying at 35C due to someone having dumped large amounts of food everywhere and a huge number of flies at the food. I assume this would also attract bears. So we found a different site and hoped nobody had reserved it.

97C
Beautiful, panoramic view of Foote Pond. The firepit is set quite a way back from the water so no view while enjoying a fire. I went the weekend following the weekend of July 4th and there was a LOT of toilet paper among the trees including unburied human waste. My recommendation to recreation.gov is to plan clean-ups following big weekends.

This is great campsite and It's pleasant

We went on a weekday, and it was soooo beautiful and quiet. But when the weekend came, we could hear music and laughter from the campsites 1/4 mile away! Lots of poison ivy; be aware. Pretty easy to get down to the river, about a 4-foot slope with some rocks to step on. The people before us left us a 1/4 cord of split lumber and a nice note.

We camped at site 061W, and the site itself is absolutely amazing! It is HUGE—the largest campsite we’ve stayed at yet—and has tons of shade for almost the entire day. The beach area is also really nice, clean, and not mucky, which was a huge plus. Wear water shoes! I did see a shiny lure in the water I couldn’t get to.

The one major warning I would give is: do not underestimate how difficult it is to get your camping gear back to this site. If you follow the designated signs and trail to 061W, you have to go up and down several very steep hills. Getting a loaded wagon down those hills is extremely difficult and really takes at least two people to slowly maneuver it, with one person basically risking being run over by the wagon if it gets away from you.

There is another trail that makes access easier, but using it means cutting directly through three other campsites, which isn’t really appropriate when those sites are occupied.

We were extremely lucky to have a friend camping with us who brought his boat and was able to transport our gear in and out that way. Without the boat, I’m honestly not sure we would have been able to make the camping trip work.

Overall, 061W is an incredible site once you’re there—huge, shady, and with a great beach area—but be prepared for a serious challenge getting your gear in and out. If you have access to a boat, I would highly recommend using it.

Beautiful campsite. Felt very tucked-away and private, and the stairway/ramp down to the water was so helpful for launching our kayaks! Could hear cars from the road a tiny bit from time to time, but very distant and quiet. Overall it was a serene and peaceful site, we loved it!