White Horse Lake Campground

The road in is dirt for about 11 miles. It was ok in most parts, although there is quite a few spots with heavy washboarding. Also, watch out for the herd of sheep that cross the road...they do NOT move when you beep the horn...we decided to take a break on the road until they decided to give way.

There was a nice amount of space between each site. There were some tent campers, a couple of van conversions and quite a few RV and TT's. There were no pull through sites, but there was enough room to turn around and back in.

The fish had been stocked with trout earlier in the week. My grandkids loved fishing there.

It was nice and quiet after hours...but because this is a family oriented campground, there was lots of activity and noise during the day.

We just spent 4 nights at White Horse, Wednesday-Sunday. It's fine during the low occupancy mid-week. The view of the lake is nice. Weekends are another story. I think the food truck has a lot to do with attracting all the boon-docking ATVers for miles around; groups of them roaring through the campground on their way to the food truck. In the absence of tighter restrictions on ATVs in Forest Service campgrounds, I can only suggest moving the unnecessary food truck to the campground entrance.

This campground used to be my favorite ….. not anymore. Fees have gone up every year, cleanliness went down. The toilets, the commode was filthy dirty and was never cleaned. Toilet paper ran out long before it was replaced once a day at 7:30 PM. All trash barrels were bolted shut, there was a sign to use a dumpster somewhere. Now I am surprised there was still water coming out of the spigot. What will they cut out next year, plus raising the rate. This year, the camping fee is Cash only, no receipt given. I am done with this campground.

I recommend this campground and will continue to stay here, we enjoy it. There are, however, pros and cons.
Pros- Dog friendly. The hosts are very helpful, enforce the park rules and friendly. There are enough trails to hike ( we recommend the hike around the lake). The park is isolated but close enough to Williams (a 20-25 minute one way trip) . Great star gazing spots. Lake is great for kayaks with private rental group. A snack bar. If you time it right, the dirt road is graded and smooth, as opposed to choppy. As is the usual, weekday crowd and traffic is good.

Cons- Rules must be enforced on weekends, including music and off road vehicles. Park can be a drive if you need an item ( 20-25 minute round trip) in a pinch. Bathrooms are cleaned frequently but can still have that smell- be mindful where they are when reserving your spot. Weekend crowds and traffic can be much. INTERMITTENT CELL USE.

The road in and out was ridiculously bumpy. It was not great for the RV. It has become washboarded. It would take a lot of work to make it smooth and would probably become washboarded again soon.
Knowing that we would return again. Just have to drive slow. If everyone drove slow it would probably help too.
The campground was nice. Has a snack bar too. The trash receptacles are still screwed shut forcing campers to take their trash to a larger bin. Some of the bathrooms were still closed. I suppose this is a product of covid and cutbacks in budget. But otherwise it is a very nice site.

First and foremost…the road in will adversely affect your RV. I would not come here again just because I choose not to destroy my equipment with mikes of washboarded roads and fine dust that will get everywhere. If this had a better road to it, it would be a great little campground. However, this issue has been stated by others, and I’m here to reiterate it. Tent campers should enjoy, and the small lake was lovely.

Also, no water on, which wasn’t communicated via Recreation.gov, but luckily I found this to be the case prior to going so brought plenty. The dump station is closed as there is a host parked there. This is a big negative as far as I’m concerned.

Noise from OHV traffic parading through the campground and constantly barking dogs in other sites were other annoying things that kept us from enjoying a beautiful and what should have been peaceful location.

The camp host admonished us about parking a vehicle off the edge of the paved site driveway on smashed down dead pine needles, yet did absolutely nothing about constantly barking dogs and generators that were run during quiet hours or even ALL NIGHT at a nearby site. Very disappointed in many aspects here about posting rules but not upholding them, and the Kaibab National Forest should be providing better service to its patrons if they are going to charge full rates.

The positives, including the gorgeous setting, were the hiking at nearby Sycamore Canyon gorge, the great little snack shack at the lake day use area, watching the fishing osprey at the lake, and the fairly clean and well-stocked pit/vault toilets.

All in all though, I would pick many other campgrounds in neighboring National Forests before I would consider returning here. 2 of 5 stars and honestly considered lower but then considered some of the good things about the location.

Verizon service was hit and miss bouncing from 1 to 2 bars but I was able to use the internet some.

There are several ways to reach the campground but all are Forest Service dirt washboard roads. Even at slow speeds the kitchen sink in our RV bounced loose!

Once you survive, the drive was worthwhile. Very nicely laid out camp sites, with some having concrete or gravel pads, and lake views. Numerous vault toilet restrooms that are clean, well stocked, and scent free. There is a snack shack that serves burgers, hot dogs and sweet treats. Kayak rentals are also available at the snack shack. It is a large but popular campground and fishing lake, but in early spring there were very few campers. Would definitely return to camp here again.

This is the website as the link they have here is broken.

https://www.fs.usda.gov/recarea/kaibab/recarea/?recid=11664

Will review the campsite when I stay there.