Agency-listedUSFSFee
Cottonwood Campground
Drive-up · U.S. Forest Service · WA · 46.90673, -121.02653
Ask an AI about this campsiteOpens Grok already loaded with this site. It reads the same records this page is built from, and links whatever it tells you.
Ask about this camp →U.S. Forest Service lists this as a developed campground. Expect marked sites, a fee station or a reservation, and the usual campground rules. The dispersed-camping freedom of the surrounding forest does not apply inside it. What changes is conditions — roads, gates, closures, fire rules. Check those with the unit before you commit to the drive.
Nearest road on the Forest Service MVUM — Cottonwood Campground · Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest · WA
No road within 1 mi of the pin in the national MVUM layer — and that layer carries no data at all for this forest (unit 0617), so this is the layer's silence, not the ground's. Access may be a county road or unmapped.
From the Forest Service's own Motor Vehicle Use Map roads layer (EDW, Clearinghouse refresh Aug 30, 2026), straight-line from the pin to the nearest mapped segment. The nearest segment is not necessarily the way in, a maintenance level is the agency's class and not a report on today, and a road's season is the road's — it is not a campground order. What the levels mean → What an MVUM is →
What the record says about the site — Cottonwood Campground · Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest · WA
- Room for 16 parties
- Tent camping
- Trailers and RVs fit
- Toilet on site
- Drinking water on site
From the OpenStreetMap contributors listing for this site — their words, not our visit. Records go stale; treat it as a starting point and confirm anything your trip depends on.
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Cottonwood Campground
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 2,263 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Cottonwood CampgroundNIFC · AirNow
Checking active fires & air quality…
Active wildfires from NIFC (within ~50 mi); air quality from AirNow. Always confirm current fire restrictions with the managing office before you go.
Everything you need — measured from Cottonwood Campground · Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest · WA
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- WWater0 mi
- GGrocery1 mi
- LLaundry1 mi
- FFuel2 mi
- DDump13 mi
- @Mail19 mi
- PPropane19 mi
- AAir-up19 mi
- HHardware20 mi
- +Urgent care20 mi
- ShShower20 mi
- EVEV fast charger20 mi
- RxPharmacy20 mi
- MMechanic20 mi
- OOutfitter20 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water is basically at camp, fuel & food sit about 1 mi out.
One dot per need — the nearest of each kind, straight-line from camp. Places from OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors); the EV fast charger from the US DOE station locator. Open in Google Maps ↗
The site — Cottonwood Campground
Access
Drive-up
Land
U.S. Forest Service
Elevation
2,263 ft
Ground slope
3.7% · gentle
State
WA
Coordinates
46.90673, -121.02653
Cost
Fee · priced on the land manager's own page (recreation.gov, read 2026-09-18)
Nearby & resupply — around Cottonwood Campground · Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest · WA (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureNaches River · under 0.1 mi · USGS: perennial river
- Also mapped (OSM)Lost Creek (stream) · mapped within 1.6 mi
- Nearest townPine Cliffs · ~0.8 mi
- Rail & highwaynone mapped within 10 mi
- Drinking waterDrinking water · ~0.0 mi
- FuelSquaw Rock Gas · ~2.4 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- Dump station~13.2 mi
- GroceriesGold Creek Grocery · ~0.8 mi
- PharmacySafeway · ~20.3 mi
- Hospital / clinicNaches Medical Clinic · ~19.7 mi
- HardwareAper's Certified Welding · ~20.1 mi
EV charging — from Cottonwood Campground · Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest · WA — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger20.2 mi straight-line N — Cle Elum, WA - West Davis Street - Tesla Supercharger (at a restaurant) · Tesla · NACS (Tesla) · 8 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-06-18 · hours: 24 hours daily. NACS partner enabled. · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reach11 within 25 mi · 36 within 50 · 374 within 100 · 620 within 150
- Nearest listing CCS20.8 mi — WCEH Cle Elum, Cle Elum
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO20.8 mi — WCEH Cle Elum, Cle Elum
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)20.3 mi — Cle Elum 1: 111 N Harris Ave · EV Connect · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: 24 hours daily
- Pricing at the fast chargernot listed
- Power (kW)not listed by AFDC — “DC fast” spans roughly 24 to 350 kW, so ask the network.
- Read this honestlyStraight-line miles, like every distance on this site. Roads run longer than this, and you have to get back. We know where a charger is listed. We don’t know if it works today, how fast it is, or the road miles. Check the network before you commit.
Snapshot 2026-09-16 · AFDC record 308414 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Cottonwood Campground · Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest · WA — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- Vault / pit toiletCottonwood · at this camp · USFS
- Portable toiletUpper Rock Creek Sno-Park · ~2.8 mi E · USFS
- Portable toiletSpring Creek Sno-Park · ~2.9 mi NW · USFS
- Portable toiletNile Sno-Park · ~3.9 mi S · USFS
Coming out here — Cottonwood Campground · Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest · WA
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Naches River as a perennial river, under 0.1 mi from the pin (National Hydrography Dataset, data refreshed October 2022). Mapped as perennial is not the same as flowing today. Nobody has checked it for you. Filter or boil anything you drink.
- Ground slope around the pin: about 3.7% — gentle. Measured on USGS's 3DEP elevation model (1 m data here), sampled every 10 metres around the point. That is the hillside, not the ground under your wheels — a graded pullout or a bench a few metres across is too small to show up at that spacing, and nobody has checked this one for you.
- No rail line and no interstate or US route is mapped within 10 mi of the pin. Checked against the FRA/BTS North American Rail Network (data updated Jul 21, 2026) and the Census's TIGER/Line primary roads (TIGER/Line 2025, released Oct 2025). Both are national files and both are maps of what is built, not counts of what moves on it.
- Power: Dave carries his own — batteries or solar. A generator will run your rig and it is also the thing everybody camped near you can hear.
- Getting online: Dave recommends Starlink. He has had it since SpaceX introduced it, used it for four years living on the road, and it delivers as promised — several hundred nights out, and he can count on one hand the places he could not connect. The cable on his unit runs 150 feet, which is usually all it takes to find enough sky. Starlink → Referral link — Starlink pays Dave $100 in cash if you sign up through it, and that money funds this site and the next trip. It costs you nothing and does not change the recommendation.
Open Cottonwood Campground elsewhere
Other camps near Cottonwood Campground
If this one is full, gated or washed out.
- Halfway Flat Campground (South)~5.5 mi · fee
- Sawmill Flat~5.7 mi · fee
- Halfway Flat Campground (North)~6.0 mi · fee
- Halfway Flat Campground (Main)~6.1 mi · fee
The unit that manages Cottonwood Campground
Stay limits, road closures and fire restrictions at Cottonwood Campground are set by Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest, not by the campsite — check there before you go.
How we know this — Cottonwood Campground
Fee note
$22 a night per the Recreation.gov page, read 18 Sep 2026: https://www.recreation.gov/camping/campgrounds/234016
Reserve
https://www.recreation.gov/camping/campgrounds/234016
Source
OpenStreetMap contributors
Confidence
Likely — The record is good enough to put a pin on, but thin in places. Treat the details as a starting point, not gospel.
Agency page
fs.usda.gov — the land manager's own page for this site. Fees, seasons and closures are stated there first; if it disagrees with this page, it wins.
How it was placed
auto: drive (road/trail right there) | Fee 2026-09-18: $22 per night, by site type and season (Recreation.gov rates table). Source: https://www.recreation.gov/api/camps/campgrounds/234016/rates (fee_backfill, figure verified on that page).
Site details
The OpenStreetMap contributors listing's own fields for this site (site type, whether tents or trailers fit, capacity, toilet, water, campfires, reservations). Printed as the record states them, unchecked by us, and never used to make a cost claim -- the cost verdict above is decided separately and audited before every deploy.
Nearest MVUM road
US Forest Service Motor Vehicle Use Map roads layer (EDW_MVUM_01, layer 1), Clearinghouse refresh Aug 30, 2026. Straight-line distance from the pin to the nearest mapped segment within 1 mi; surface type, maintenance level and open dates are the agency's own values for that segment, expanded from its codes and otherwise unedited. Nothing here says which road reaches the site.
EV chargers
US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center station locator, snapshot 2026-09-16. Straight-line miles to the nearest public, open, unrestricted station; restricted and planned units are shown but never counted.
Field check
On the agency's books. The land manager inventoried this site, so its existence is not in question — current conditions are. Nobody from here has camped it recently.
What we don’t know about Cottonwood Campground
A land record can put you within a few meters of a spot. It cannot tell you any of this — so check it yourself, and treat anything below as the open question it is.
- Whether that tap is running today, and whether any stream or lake here is drinkable — the record covers the supply the site provides, nothing else
- Road surface & last-mile access
- How many rigs actually fit
- Cell coverage by carrier
- Seasonal & winter access
- Current fire restrictions
- Shade & wind exposure
- Noise and who else shows up
- Whether a listed EV charger works today, or the road miles to it
Before you go — Cottonwood Campground
Finding water out here →What “dispersed” means here →Reading a forest MVUM →Reading the aerial →All field notes →