Jacob Lake Campground
Campground

Jacob Lake Campground

Shaded forest camping minutes from Jacob Lake Inn

(359)
Fredonia, AZ

About

Jacob Lake Campground is a Kaibab National Forest campground on Highway 67 in Jacob Lake, about a 40-mile drive to the North Rim entrance. It's the practical, budget-friendly alternative to booking a room, and with a 4.4 rating from 356 reviews, it's clearly a favorite for people road-tripping through. Sites sit under ponderosa pine cover, restrooms are cleaned and trash collected daily, and camp hosts keep an eye on things.

What to Expect

  • Group sites are arranged around a central ramada with a shared fire pit and benches rather than fully separated individual spots — reviewers note it works well for groups traveling together.
  • No dump station on-site; RVers can pay to dump at nearby Kaibab Camper Village down the road.
  • Jacob Lake Inn's store, bakery, and restaurant are just across the highway for supplies, coffee, and their well-known cookies.
  • A small day-use fee applies even if you're just stopping to use the restroom, so budget a few dollars if you're not staying overnight.

It's a straightforward, well-run base camp for exploring the North Rim without the lodge-booking scramble — reserve ahead for summer weekends, since Jacob Lake fills up fast in peak season.

Reviews (359)

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4.4

359 reviews

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Vincent Sheridan
Vincent Sheridan

3 months ago

The campsite has a paved entrance with (dusty) gravel paths to the loops. There are very clean, accessible vault toilets that are lit at night in various places within the park and large trash dumpsters. There are spigots for potable water near the restrooms. The sites are of various sizes and depths but it appears few if any are level. Our site (#34) easily fit our 40 foot Class A but required eight inches of cribbing under the front tires to achieve level. Some of the sites looked great for tent camping. Sunlight for solar is limited due to the trees. StarLink functions without buffering but again, the trees do cause obstruction. Traffic through the campground is slowed by some serious speed bumps. They don’t seem to affect pickup trucks much but they’ll tip a fridge in an RV if not careful. Make sure everything is secure as it doesn’t matter how slow you go, it’s akin to rolling off a curb. Highway noise is present throughout the day but it isn’t intrusive. It goes away at night and is replaced with sounds of the forest. The pine smell was amazing. This campground has no hookups (unless you’re the host). Bring your own water in as the spigots are not intended to fill RV tanks. For power, you’ll need a generator as recharging from solar is pretty hit and miss. There is no dump station so you’ll need to make other arrangements. The overall campground is very clean and well tended. The hosts were friendly and quite visible. The ground squirrels are numerous and just as friendly. They didn’t chew anything that we owned which is good but they do like to climb on things. Don’t leave food or trash outside as I suspect they’ll pilfer anything edible or usable in their burrows. Although there’s quite a bit of dispersed campsites in the area and a FHU RV Park nearby, I’d stay here again as my first choice.

Katie Klas
Katie Klas

3 months ago

Great Boondocking campground. Clean, quiet and great location. Beautiful trees and good space between sites. Great trail in the campground. Right across the street from Jacob Lake Inn, with the Best cookies anywhere. Also the Forest visitors Center is right next door to the Inn and it is great but very limited hours. More hummingbirds than you can count at the visitors center. Hosts were great and toilets were very clean and no smell inside.

My husband and I pulled in and stayed the night on May 23-24th/26. The campground is lovely, the campground hosts on duty were awesome!! Very welcoming and helpful!! Campground is well taken care of, bathrooms were clean and lots of access to drinkable water. There is a lovely walking/running trail along the edge of the campground. Only reason I gave the campground a 4 star rating instead of 5 is because there was no shower facilities. Otherwise, this place is a gem!

What a wonderful time we had! We stayed in the Group A site. Beautiful Ramada and area. The bathrooms were cleaned daily and the trash was collected twice a day. The only thing we didn’t love was that there wasn’t actual individual sites. There were just divets around the Ramada. In the end, it was actually decent to have everyone face that way. Also the campfire pit had benches. We would love to come back here depending on what happens with this fire right now. It’s just a quick jaunt to the north rim but from what I’ve been told, it’s burned down 😭. The store and lodge across the street is fantastic and has amazing cookies!

Carolyn Watson
Carolyn Watson

3 months ago

Don’t get out of your car unless you plan to pay. We just drove through to check it out and to use the restroom. The campground host pulled behind our car and made us pay $8 because we used the restroom.

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