First Come, First Served

Lamenting the campsites I'll never visit

I like to have a plan before I walk out my front door. Actually, I like to have multiple plans, so I can pretend to be spontaneous in case something knocks the initial plan off course. Oh, this restaurant has an hour wait? Let me casually suggest the bar down the street that I’ve already vetted or how about a walk around the nearby park that I know features a cool historical marker. See, I can go with the flow!

However, not everything can be planned for—like campgrounds that don’t accept reservations. 

I took a trip earlier this fall that was timed around two things—the expiration date on my NPS pass and the last day I could reserve a campsite at the Beaver Lake campground in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest. Beaver Lake offers ten campsites and though half are reservable online, they all become first come, first served (FCFS) in October.¹ Since it’s a seven hour drive from Chicago to Beaver Lake, I wasn’t especially keen to just head up and hope there would be a place for me. My solution? Book a site for the very last day of the reservable season, with the assumption that I would be able to extend my reservation on-site the next day—if my tent was already set up, it would be hard for a newcomer to scoop the site out from under me!

My campsite was spectacular. Not only did I have lake views from every inch of the site, I had my own direct access to the water, with a spit of sand big enough for a couple chairs. If you are a paddler, you could launch a canoe or kayak from one of the three waterfront sites² and enjoy the sunset from the middle of the lake. I couldn’t get a single bar of cell service anywhere in the campground, which meant that I read uninterrupted for hours, enjoying a true escape from my work email.

I was also well-positioned for hiking—the North Country Trail passes a few hundred feet from the campground and I only had to drive about 20 minutes visit Copper Falls State Park and St. Peter’s Dome & Morgan Falls Recreation Area³. And the best part? It was cheaper to spend two nights at Beaver Lake than a single night at Copper Falls because of the out-of-state resident surcharge for campsites at Wisconsin State Parks.⁴

As I relaxed around my campfire with a book and a backdrop of early fall foliage, a thought creeped into my mind: “What other amazing places have I been missing out on because I avoid FCFS campsites?”

To be clear, I backpack on plenty of trails where there aren’t reservations and I manage just fine.⁵ But in the backcountry it is acceptable to ask to share a site, especially if it is close to sunset and there aren’t other legal camping options nearby. In a drive-in campground, the expectation is that each site is for a single group or family, so when spots fill up, you’re out of luck.

Campgrounds will always be crowded on popular travel weekends—Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day—but there are plenty of local events that can cause a run on campsites and might not readily show up in a Google search. It’s hard to keep tabs on all the fishing tournaments and town festivals happening in the areas where I might want to recreate!

So, how do people have the confidence to load up their car and just show up at a campground? Perhaps they live nearby, so there’s no harm if the campground is full. Maybe they have a list of backup options and aren’t attached to any particular location. Regardless, I envy their flexibility and sense of adventure.

There are some advantages to staying at FCFS campgrounds. You save on fees by not reserving online. Many campers will be familiar with the $8 service fee charged for reservations made on recreation.gov. For those staying at one campground for multiple nights, that $8 (which goes to the private company that runs the website and not to the parks) may not be an issue because it only increases the overall price per night by a couple bucks. But for the roadtripping camper who wants to bounce from place to place, an $8 reservation fee each night for a new campground can uncomfortably stretch a budget. Paying on-site avoids this fee without reducing the amount that goes to the actual parks.

Sometimes the best or only camping option in a particular area is FCFS. When I backpacked Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore a few years ago, I wasn’t sure how I would feel at the end of my 42 miles—specifically, I didn’t know if I would be energetic enough to drive five hours to the guest room at my parents’ house. I researched camping several spots along my route and the most convenient ones I found were all FCFS.

Heading out on a trip with a rough itinerary, but no reservations, is also a great way to explore interesting spots that might not show up on Google. I aspire to be the type of person that stumbles across a great campsite or roadside attraction and changes plans in order to spend a night there.

But I am not.

Instead, I stick to the known quantities and can only wonder about the many campsites I will never visit.

1. Though everything says that FCFS starts on October 1, the online registration system won’t accept reservations beginning on September 30th. My guess is that it’s because the reservation would end on October 1, but it could just be an unrelated tech glitch.

2. The sites with waterfront access are 5, 7, & 8. Sites 5 & 8 had flatter driveways, so they would be more suitable if you are bringing a camper or multiple cars. The parking area for site 7 is steeper, but the main part of the site is set further back from the road and feels more private.

3.

4. I don’t begrudge the Wisconsin DNR for trying to fund their parks in any way they can. The state gives very little money to the State Park system, so campsite fees and vehicle passes make up much of the operating budget. For those interested in learning more about how the state supports conservation, here’s a primer on where the money comes from and where it goes: https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/politics/2023/03/29/wisconsin-is-lagging-in-conservation-parks-spending-new-report-says/70039338007/

5. Well, at least most of the time I manage. Sometimes I hike an extra five miles just to avoid asking another person to share a campsite: