Quaking Aspen Campground

Visited here in Oct during a long weekend and it was the perfect way to disconnect and recharge. The campsites are clean and the host Tim is the best! He's so friendly and talks to everyone and sells firewood by the bundle. Bring cash if you want to get some.Definitely fuel up and get your supplies before hand -- there aren't any grocery stores or gas stations nearby. Last place to fuel up is in Springville. Pro Tip: make sure to get your campfire permit and print it out beforehand

Stayed at Quaking Aspen in June 2023 for a few nights at a tent campsite. The campground is run by a concessionaire for the NFS. I did not see a camp host the entire time we were there. It is tucked in off of the Western Divide Hwy in Sequoia National Forest. The campground has a single ring of family campsites and 2 large group campsites across the meadow. There are several sites that have yurts which can be reserved/ rented for your stay. These sites had bear lockers. The more primitive site did not have a bear locker. That was disappointing. An adjacent campsite was instructed to put food in your car at night and activate your car alarm if a bear comes around. Not ideal in my opinion. The primitive site have a fire ring and picnic table. For site 09, the fire ring was in bad shape and the picnic was bent down on both sides. There are vault toilets and water spigots around the campground. Toilets were clean and stocked. Since the camp host was nonexistent, we went to the Ponderosa general store to get firewood. Unfortunately, it burned down recently. Ended up getting firewood at the campground next to the Trail of 100 giants and foraging in the forest. Plenty of hiking in the area. Overall, decent campground with some shortcomings.

Quaking Aspen is a super nice campground. It is kept really clean and is great for families. We got spot 8 which also had a yurt that comfortably slept our family at four. There is potable water near every site and plenty of pit toilets. We chose the spot due to its proximity to the Ponderosa General Store. Unfortunately, and very sad to report, the store burned down in February. We were counting on the store for some provisions. Luckily, the camp host had firewood and ice on the weekends. The campground is wooded but all of the hikes surrounding have burned down in recent years. We were here on a really hot day and we found a little swimming hole about a mile and a half down the road on the left near another camp road. It was exactly what we needed to cool off on a hot day.

Beautiful campground. We've been coming here for years, first in a tent and recently in our 30' class c motorhome. The roads are a bit narrow and it may be hard/impossible to get a larger rig into some of the spots, but if you can, it's worth it.

A review for the anxious camper (like myself):First of all, this is a great campsite. I went June 27-29, 2022, and honestly, there was nothing to complain about. Everyone was nice, my neighbors were quiet, the place was in a beautiful area, and I got to see some Giant Sequoias just a quick drive away! I stayed at campsite #15 and it was a GREAT location. I walked around the campground my second day and noticed that a lot of the sites differ from each other, so each one is unique in its own way. But I recommend #15 for solo or 2-3 tents! Some tips: - buy your firewood before heading up. I read that people bought bundles on site, but that wasn't a thing when I went. You CAN drive a few minutes to Ponderosa and ask for firewood. The guy at the lodge charged me 10$ to grab as many logs as I wanted. (I'd say visit Ponderosa anyways because said lodge is a really cute place to buy supplies, food, drinks, etc.) - you CAN forage for wood as well- I'm not sure if it was because I was near the bathrooms, but I had some of the most persistent flies following me around during the day. So make sure you bring fly repellant or something!! - GETTING THERE: it says on Apple Maps that the road is closed a little before the campsite... that is NOT TRUE. use google maps or just follow highway 190 East from Porterville through Springville. No closed roads. - there is a lot of dirt around, so be ready to get dusty clothes & shoes (I brought baby wipes to help that). - there's a nice hiking trail beside campsite #23- at the "Trail of 100 Giants" (which is about 13ish miles away from camp), it's 12$ cash to park and go on the trail. Definitely worth it. Anyways... overall I had a great time. Definitely a nice campground if you don't want to go all the way into the national park but still want to experience the giant sequoia trees/sequoia national forest. :) P.S.: I drove an EV car, and was able to make the trip nicely! I topped up in Porterville (that charger was okay... better ones in Bakersfield) and left with 240 miles. Got to the campsite with 120mi (uphill driving!), but on the way back down I was back up to about 190mi. I took the 190 highway through springville there, and went back down past California Hot Springs.

Very quiet campground (after we left lol); Mark the camp attendant was amazing but had very little information about the area trails as he had been there only for 3 months. We asked about bears and he mentioned that was not an issue there; so we slept with our toiletries inside our test (WHICH I LOVED!!!!) Our group rented site B; a 25 person; 4 car site ($7 or an additional vehicle) I wouldn't recommend this site for 2 reasons: most of the cleared ground is in an incline; second, site A has to walk through the site to get to the bathroom and parking lot so it can get annoying to hear people walk by your tent all all hrs of the night not to mention the brightness from their flashlights.Site A is too far from the bathrooms and you'll get the sticky eye for walking through site B. Best group site in my opinio is C-- semi-secluded with tons of sitting area and pretty close to the bathroom. Yes, it's a 50 person site but at the very least you'll have plenty of space for your group of 25 or more. My selling point was seeing the wood benches carved out of pine trees around the fire pit.I'm giving this campground 5*s based on our experience and activities around here-- oh, and lack of bears lol the only animal you have to worry about are the mosquitoes on late evenings.There's an easy hike that starts behind campsite #23 that goes all the way to Quaker Meadow.I would recommend Freeman CreeksTrail (a 2-3 min drive from here). It's beautiful, it has shade, lots of trees, bridges and in some parts it runs parallel to a creek.Also, there's Dome Rock-- the views from here are breathtaking and more so during the night. I would suggest you go around 7 p.m. or around sunset for a beautiful view of the whole valley below and for you to scout a sitting area to go back and stargaze around 10 p.m. This was legit the highlight for me.This spot is a 10 min drive from the campsite. The dirt road could be rough so use caution if you're driving a small vehicle.

This place was awesome my whole family loved it ... the drive up a lil sad due to all the trees that were burned ! But when we got to quaking camp grounds nothing but tall green trees ... this place is amazing!!!!

Just had a weekend here and it was excellent! Tim the camp host was the hero of the day after a two separate incidents that we were stupidly unprepared for. He saved us with a first aid kit and then jump leads the day after so it was an eventful time let's say! The camp itself is basic as we knew, pit toilets and no cell phone reception. Tim let us use his line to call AAA. He went beyond to make sure we safe. He's dedicated to keeping the place clean and well organized. There's amazing bike trails opposite the campsite and out the back of it also. I would advise taking cash for fire wood. Thanks again Tim for all your assistance.

Quaking Aspen Campground is a pretty campground in Sequoia National Forest. All sites, including the yurts are primitive meaning no electricity and no plumbing. Yurts have a full sized futon and a twin-over-full sized bunk bed. You must bring your own bedding. Toilets are vault and are well maintained. There are no sinks, there are spigots only. The camp host is there Thursday-Sunday and most of the time has wood bundles for $8. He is a friendly and informative host who keeps Quaking Aspen nice and clean. You should come fully prepared for your stay before heading up. The closest store is 45min away so stock up on ice, wood and other necessities before passing Camp Nelson (on route 190). Bring bug spray- there is a pretty meadow along the campground but that means water which equates to mosquitos and other bugs. I enjoyed my stay here. It was quiet and relatively small (I think about 30 sites).

This Labor Day weekend was insanely hot. The temps coming from Orange County was no less than 105 and up to 118 driving to the campsite. We were very worried about the temps, but miraculously, just 5-10 mins before we arrived to the campsite, the temp dropped almost 5-10 degrees! Very pleasantly surprised. We were also surprised by the amount of greenery around the campsite, despite seeing a whole lot of yellow and burned tree trunks almost all the way up the mountain. We had group site B, which is nice and spacious. We were charged $8 extra per day per car, over 4 cars. We had access to 3 bathrooms and each had running water outside of them where we could wash our dishes and ourselves (no showers). The vault toilets did have a lot of flies and bees during the day, but that was to be expected.Group site A had to walk through our site which wasn't ideal, but not a deal breaker.We visited the rock slides (Upper and Lower Coffee Camp) about 45 mins down the mountain (very, very windy road). Very crowded and limited parking, but we were able to make it work. Nice place to cool down. There was a supply store on the way where we could buy fishing supplies, food, medicine and there is a restaurant there as well, but we did not eat there. The people were nice and there is wifi there is you need it. Nobody had cell service at the camp site across most of the providers, Verizon included.Fishing at the rock slides didn't work since there were so many people. We ended up near Camp Nelson / Coy Flatt, in Belknap Creek which was nice but no fish to be seen. We couldn't find any decent fishing spots near the campground at all. The other camps didn't have any luck either.