Del Norte Coast Redwoods State Park

Besides the creek being dried up and no fishing as it was advertised on the .gov website we enjoyed ourselves a great deal there.
Nice and relaxing place to camp and enjoy the Redwoods.
The ocean is just a quick drive away. We really enjoyed our day trips to Crescent City.

I took a camping roadtrip down the PCH and this was one of our stops. Out of the 7 campgrounds we stayed at throughout Oregon and California, this was by far the best. Very lush and shaded, and roomy sites. We had site 99, which from the looks of it, was one of the absolute best in the campground. We had our own private driveway up a small hill leading up into our very secluded site surrounded by redwoods. It was gorgeous.
CONS: The roads through the campground need some serious repaving.
PROS: Everything else.

I’ve stayed here a couple times and love it! Secluded campsites, lots of hiking trails, flush toilets with showers.

Mill creek campground– we arrived in our Toyota Camry (vs our 4Runner) as we were on a road trip from Seattle to Southern California and this was a midpoint stop for us. The ranger checking us in (ranger Henderson) demanded we turn off our engine and not so politely inquired if we had a reservation. We did and gave her the information. She pulled it up and saw there was also a trailer with the site reservation which my parents were bringing. Ranger Henderson then asked my husband and I a series of questions about the trailer (size, length, etc) and we kept saying do you see a trailer?, it isn’t ours, we don’t know the specifics… She then proceeds to demand payment for an extra vehicle from us and we said no this is OUR reservation, my parents are brining THEIR trailer and joining US for our reservation. She then went in to the booth for some time, all the while a number of cars were backing up including my parents which took them 30 minutes to check in, and came back out saying she guess she shouldn’t have assumed it wasn’t our reservation then only let is into the campground after a very rude lecture on the Bears and cleaning up after ourselves. Will absolutely not come here again and will discourage anyone from Mill Creek Campground.

If your coming from the LA area make sure you have your Dramamine before taking the trip up here, but once you drive into this campground its Magestic! We loved the Redwoods hovering over us and the campsites were all unique! We had the best campsite #140. #3,55&50 were also one of the better ones, but really you can’t go wrong with any except for #141-(yikes try not to get this tiny mosquito infested one!!) Anyways they deserve 5 stars for sure… Thanks for the memories Mill Creek

This place is so pretty– i can tell you the best sites to rent too!
104
140
109
126
14
26
32
33
45
38 BEST
39
we stayed at 140 and would take that one in hearbeat, they have bike camps which are smaller and some have steps to a plateform so cool moss everywhere its like a fairy campground. This place rocks, paid showers and the bathroom could use more attention how3ever check in people rock and the place is gorgeous take your family there for sure!

This is a review of the Mill Creek Campground.
We stayed in site #16 and while it was fine (certainly private and lush, as everything is in this area), there are many better sites. We showed up late in the day without a reservation so no complaints about the site. I will, however, take a moment to complain about the price. $ 35 to camp is fairly common in California but that doesn’t make it right. Public parks, especially, have a duty to offer low cost camping options, in my opinion, and while backcountry camping in Redwoods is free, it is pretty restricted. (And one of our kids had a broken leg at the time, so it wasn’t really an option for us.)
Anyway, many other sites were just as private as #16 yet had more space and/​or were just cooler. Several other reviews make specific recommendations that seem like reasonable advice. In addition, site #55, I believe, was one of the more unique sites I’ve ever seen because of how it was situated around some of the impressive/​depressing redwood stumps that are all around this campground.

This was the best campsite I have been to in a long time! Beautiful. Just beautiful and so much to do in the area. Def will be back again next summer. Well worth the drive time from Sacramento.

I camped inside the park for 6 days at site 76. The park is nice and not as moist and damp as something slightly closer to the coast like Prairie Creek, although I felt like there were more mosquitos inside this park at dusk. During the day in July you will find yourself wearing short shelves even deep within the forest sine you are a bit more inland. I didn’t find there to be as many awesome trails right within the park, but the scenery was certainly still beautiful. You’ll be close to Crescent City if you need supplies, you’re close to the beach if you want sand, close to the Smith River if you want to fish, and right in the middle of great redwood hiking. There are so many great hikes in the area– explore the short trails around Walker Road on 199 and Boyscout Trail on Howland Road. The bathrooms at the campground are pretty clean too. I would certainly come back but there are so many options up in this area I am slowly migrating through all the large state park campgrounds in the area.

We had the greatest time at Del Norte campground also know as Mills Creek. We saw Bacon the bear many times and he never bothered anyone. The camp site #64 was great so clean next to bathroom and shower just a short walk away. The Host was also very close to is and sold fire wood for $ 8.00. We took and average of the ranger guided tours and went to the tide pool tour. Our 5 year old daughter had the time of her life getting to touch starfish and crabs shrimp and many other ocean life. I can’t wait to return hear next time. Everyone should come to Del Norte

Enjoyed this campsite very much. Clean and well maintained. We stayed for 5 days and we were not eager to leave. It has a couple of small hiking trails and that is why I only gave it 4 stars because we had to drive a few miles to do the damnation trail hike or fish at Jedediah. Campsites # 47, 48, 50 & 51 were all good. Close to restrooms, quiet and a little secluded. Pretty good size too. We went at the end of July and even though we hade a handful of children in our group, nights were quiet. The campsite is monitored day and night.

We used Del Norte campground as a week-​long base camp for Redwood adventures. I tried to book a site in the popular Jedediah campground but there were no openings. Luckily this campground wasn’t bad at all. I selected site #22, a tent-​only site. Turns out the site was a little too small for a 16×10 tent but we made it work. This site is up the side of a hill with 12 – 15 stairs leading to it. It was very secluded, lush and away from the foot traffic leading to the bathrooms. The bathrooms had 2 coin operated showers with benches. The bathrooms were kept relatively clean. No complaints. You can purchase wood from one of the two camp hosts for $ 8 a bundle. Unfortunately we didn’t explore the campground trails too much — there’s at least one family friendly one — because we were out at other parks all day. Definitely a nice campground.

This place was fantastic. I messed up my reservation the week of 4^th of July, but luckily they still had sites around 2−3pm in the afternoon. We ended up grabbing a really great wooded & private site and proceeded to wander around the campground. There’s a great (and easy) 1.5 mile hike around the campground that passes through some redwoods and creeks. There’s also a really cool amphitheater made of trees that we checked out.
Overall, really good vibes and beautiful coastal drive. Wouldn’t hesitate to come back here.

The Del Norte Coast Redwoods are more accessible than Jedediah Smith Redwoods but this also means many of the shorter walks are much more inhabited (large trampled areas, fortified walkways). That doesn’t stop it from being beautiful and it has the added bonus of having accessible trails for folks with limited mobility.
I do recommend the visitors center here over the one in Crescent City, it’s smaller but had a more inviting feel and (admittedly I had limited exposure here) the person working here was much friendlier than the one up at the main visiters center.
I view it as a must stop along 101 when visiting the surrounding parks.

My family and I were planning a trip to the redwoods early this August. When looking at campsites both in books and online, we found that the most popular sites were already reserved (the most popular being Jedediah Smith Campground). We also didn’t want to be near the beach because of the nightly temperature drops. We came across Del Norte (formerly Mill Creek Campground) and preceded to make a reservation.
I could not be any more delighted and happy with our decision to stay at Del Norte. I have no doubt that we will return again, but definitely to a new campsite # to try different ones. We further learned from a ranger that the campsite had been closed for a while until the Redwoods SP system picked it up. We all thought it was really clean and well-​maintained. Some of the highlights that we found:
— Extremely secluded campsites, all of which had something special to their layout
— Nightly ranger presentations for the family on a big screen. One of the nights was phonology, where we heard about the salmon’s cycle of reproduction
— Many bathrooms, so one is always nearby
— Many trails to do within the campsite
— It was surprisingly not that cold at night (maybe because there was no wind)
— A short 15 minute drive to Stout Grove and Crescent City
Some notes:
— Bring coins for the shower (i.e. $ 1.00 is good for 8 minutes)
— I thought campsite #88 was the best! It was up on a mini-​hill of its own. Downside is that the car is parked at the bottom so you have to carry everything up
— Absolutely no cellphone reception for AT&T customers
— Firewood is sold there by the rangers
— There is no designated time for fires to be put down, but the campsite was family oriented so by 9pm there was not a sound in the air
— You can use your parking permit to get into any other national park for free! (i.e. Fern Canyon)

This is where Mill Creek Campground is located, so when booking the Del Norte Coast RSP, know that they are they same! I had a pretty tough time figuring this out, so let me be your saving grace: Yes, you are going to the Mill Creek Campground.
I have always wanted to camp in the redwoods, and so accepted the rate of $ 35/​night as a reasonable price to pay. I was not wrong. The campground was beautful and each site was so private. The backdrop of ours (59) was just amazing forest, complete with banana slugs the size of a banana, cute snails, and the funniest inch worms.
I did not shower, so I cannot comment on that aspect. I can say, though, that the bathrooms were very clean. They were lacking hot water and soap, but that’s what hand sanitizer is for, right?
Normally I am so sick of camping after a couple of days that I would willingly accept jail for the right to set fire to every tent I see. After this weekend, I didn’t want to leave! Either my husband is changing me or this was one heck of a campground!