Cottonwood Campground

This is a stellar site. For $10/night ($5 seniors or NP pass holders), you get the shade of cottonwood trees and a nice river for swimming. This area is hot and barren in the summer, and the Cottonwood campground is a welcoming oasis. The grounds are green and well maintained, with a day use picnic area, boat launch, $5 (for camp patrons, $10 for non-campers) dump station, and horse shoe area. There are separate Men's and Women's vault toilets, and water available at spigots.

We got no mobile internet access, but the site host allows campers to use wifi, you just have to ask for the password.

Stay limit is 14 days.

Driving between Stanley ID and Missoula this campground is right off Rt 93. It's a Small campground, vault toilets, boat ramp, shady from Cottonwoods with river flowing by sites.

We stayed here for quick access to Goldbug Hot Springs. The campground is in the middle of nowhere with any sort of services or groceries quite a ways away. But it was relaxing and scenic. There are several spots that could accommodate larger trailers like ours.

The road is close by the campsites furthest from the river so there was road noise throughout the evening and night.

There isn't a lot of privacy between sites and for some reason, a small camper van was in a large pull-through site so that he could run power from the outhouse outlet. Why would he be allowed to do that?

The camp hosts were nowhere to be found when I needed to make change to pay for our spot or to take care of the off-leash dogs roaming around. I don't know why the majority of dog owners seem to disregard the signs at any trail or campground we've been to but I don't need a random dog in my site so that my leashed pets can't play safely in OUR site.

Pull in here after a long hot drive in the desert, and you enter another world. All the sites have some shade, most have lots of cottonwoods around them, and many are just steps from the Salmon River. We saw a huge beaver across the river at dusk. There’s a lovely big sandy beach to swim or sun bathe, and a nice deep calm swimming hole. Sites are asphalt but there is lawn and space between sites. This place is incredibly clean and well maintained, apparently by one camp host. Don’t drive by! Stop and stay, it’s beautiful.

We stopped for one night the end of July 2018 on the way to Stanley Basin. Very well maintained CG, great host, lots of sites with shade. The place was only half full on a busy travel day. The Salmon River abuts one side of the CG. There is water and a dump station on the way in. It's quiet, clean, level paved sites with clean campsites. We pay the senior rate but even full price is a great bargain. We'll stay here again when we travel along this route.

We loved our short stay here - calm, relaxing, cool breezes and beautiful views. The water can wash away the stress from long travel days.

We pulled in on a Friday and had only a couple of neighbors during our entire stay. The area is well maintained with a friendly on-site camp host. Sites have picnic tables, grills, and fire rings. Garbage, dump, and water fill all in the campground along with pit toilets, day use parking, boat launch, and a swimming area.

While not the best for our solar, we were able to use a portable solar panel in the paved parking spot to keep us topped up. There are a few sites that are more open to the sun, we picked a nice shady spot steps from the river.

Paved parking spot is relatively flat and easy to level. The entire area is workable for larger rigs. At 31' we had no issues getting in/out. Trees on some of the sites may cause issues for those with opposing slides.

Internet is available on Verizon (4GLTE) and nothing on TMobile or AT&T.

Nearby Challis has a great brewery, River of No Return Brewery, a grocery store, bakery and, of course, a bank. We ventured to the Challis Hot Springs to check them out as well as Bayhorse Ghost Town, well worth the visit.

While close to the road we couldn’t hear any road noise. The sound of the rushing Salmon River permeated the space so while this isn’t boondocking it does feel remote. No showers. Pit toilets were clean. Water was available from several spigots spread out throughout the grounds. Even got to see an Osprey with his freshly caught lunch. Wish we could have stayed longer.

Not a lot I can add just a vary nice place.

Don’t really want to review this beautiful little oasis as I am afraid I will never find a spot again! We paid $5 with our American the beautiful. There were several spots large enough for our 40 ft 5th wheel. We could not get a water front site, but site 13 was perfect we were tucked in and have a lovely little secluded sitting area. Very dog friendly and the Salmon River was a real treat to swim in during the warm afternoons.

Some road noise, but infrequent and not particularly loud. We had decent Verizon cell service which was improved with our booster.

Potable water on site, some sites can reach a faucet with a hose. Dump station on site is excellent!

It was a hot summer when we headed out, first towards Salmon Idaho...so we were definitely looking for shade! This small, no hookups, campground (the camp host has been here every summer for 25 years!) is well maintained and lovely, especially the spots along the river.