Camping in Idaho

Idaho is one of the United States’ premiere destinations for camping.  Its rich, lush scenery and untamed wilderness gives ample opportunity for vast campgrounds and camping areas for your family to enjoy.  Camping will give you an opportunity to spend lots of quality time with your family and give you a sense of peacefulness as you reconnect with nature together.

Banbury Hot Springs along the Snake River offers an outdoor pool with a slide and diving board, hot baths and Jacuzzis, along with campground facilities, a picnic area and a boat ramp. It is a popular spot to soak in the Thousand Springs area.

Bear Lake State Park is located in a high mountain valley in the extreme southeast corner of Idaho. At 5,900 feet elevation, the park offers a wide variety of both summer and winter recreation opportunities. Bear Lake itself is 20 miles long and 8 miles wide with half of the lake in Idaho and half in Utah. The park features four miles of sandy beaches for camping.

The Boise National Forest includes about 2,612,000 acres of forest land located north and east of the city of Boise. Most of the land is an evergreen forest that includes pure or mixed stands of ponderosa pine, Douglas fir, Engelmann spruce, lodgepole pine and subalpine fir. Elevations range from 2,600 to 9,800 feet. Visitors will find over 80 campgrounds and picnic areas providing a variety of outdoor recreation experiences.

C. J. Strike Reservoir is an outstanding fishery and also offers many campgrounds for you to spend the night with your family and enjoy the sights and sounds of the wildlife and outdoor adventures to be had in the Reservoir.  If your family goes on a hike while you’re camping, you will be able to view wagon ruts along marked remnants of the Oregon Trail.

Cottonwood Recreation Site, along the scenic Salmon River, sits among groves of cottonwoods and provides a beautiful setting for fishing and camping. It was renovated in 1998 to allow use of RVs and to provide accessible camp sites.  It includes a day use area with barbecues, tent sites, and group camp sites for you to have great meals with your family and make new friends with other campers.

There are plenty of areas to camp near Boise as well. Places like Sage Hen Reservoir and Bruneau Sand Dunes are amongst some of my family’s favorites. Every spring break, and several times during the summer we could be found at one or the other either playing and fishing in the lake at Sage Hen or rolling down the dunes and riding our bikes at Bruneau. We also liked to stay at sites along the Payette river to give us easy access for week long raftin trips down the river. Many fun-filled memories of growing up in Boise, Idaho were made at gorgeous mountain campsites near Boise. Find your Idaho home close to your favorite camping spots in today’s new listings!