North of Highland Camping Area

Still is a real gem. I returned to this campground after a 24-year absence and was pleased to find that it is still as beautiful as ever, still operated by the same family who put a lot of effort to keep this campground rustic, clean and comfortable. Next to the Cape Cod National Seashore the campground is mostly for tent camping, but they do accept small RVs and travel trailers, there are no hook-ups but there is a dump station. I don’t think there is a bad site in the entire campground, all sites are wooded among pine trees, the facilities are very nice and kept clean, the showers are excellent, there are no facilities for washing dishes which must be washed at your site. There is a laundromat, a rec room, camp store and an adult quiet room where you can recharge your devices and use Wifi, there is a nice playground for the children. Ten-minute walk via a path through the woods will take you to one of the most beautiful beaches at the National Seashore, the Head of The Meadow. Bike path entrance is just quarter mile from the campground entrance, Provincetown is just 10 min drive. This campground location is excellent if you want to use it as a base camp to explore the Outer Cape or if you just want to relax at your site, walk, bike or spend a day at the beach. Highly recommended.

We had high hopes for this campground.

First the good news. It is extremely beautiful and full of trees. There is a walking path (1/2 mile) to the Truro town beach (or the National Seashore) where the sand is lovely, and seals and whales provide a wildlife show (water is freezing but that’s the Cape).

Now to the reality. The website claims that this is a peaceful, family focused campsite. It also says that it has almost all tents and small trailers and no large RVs. It states there are no electric or water hookups. This could not be further from the truth, and the reality is that it’s a campground of two realities. Half the campground is full of massive, ghetto big rigs with airplane hangar tarps, portable showers and toilets which are running air conditioners and generators. THEY have hookups. These are the season campers and it was made very clear by the management that they defer to those campers at the expense of shorter term campers.

Those who are not there for the season are sandwiched in between the rigs. We are off grid with our van, but our solar was not recharging and thus we had an emergency lack of power. We were not allowed to plug in an extension cord for 30 minutes to briefly recharge our battery even though we were surrounded by electrical panels. We were told “then EVERYONE would want to charge their electric scooters and Segways.” This was a 90+ heat wave where we wanted to use fans with 4 kids. We asked to use an available electrical to charge for 30 minutes. It was rude, arbitrary and unreasonable.

The seasonal campers behind us smoked pot all day long. They ran their very loud air conditioning all day long. Again, this was supposedly the antithesis of what the campsite was supposed to be.

And then there was COVID. Although a detailed paper outlined their rules, none of the seasonal campers followed them. No masks in the common areas or bathrooms. The management was quick to critique the short stay campers, but had NO interest in asking the seasonal campers to comply. Again intensely stressful when we were wrangling 4 kids and their masks.

In short, if you are tent camping and want access to a beautiful beach when there is NOT a pandemic, then this is a lovely spot. However the disparity in treatment between the grim seasonal clientele and short term campers means we would never return. Add in the surly management and their inability to enforce their own rules and no thanks. It’s just not that beautiful.