Best Santa Cruz mountains camping?

What are your favorite spots in the Santa Cruz area?

I am driving down to pick up my Tepui tent this weekend and want to put it right to use and spend a night or two in the Santa Cruz area. I've stayed at big bear basin before but was wondering if there is anything more remote and scenic.

 

If you're picking it up in the morning or early afternoon, I would drive down south of Big Sur and camp along the ridge roads off Nacimiento-Fergusson Rd (north or south of N-F Rd. More detailed directions and specific locations are easy to find on the Internet. Dispersed camping is allowed, but stay on trails, bring water and a campfire permit, Tread Lightly and pack everything out. Closer to Santa Cruz, there are mostly only State Parks, none remote and some not very scenic, and I suspect all will be full this Easter weekend with nice weather, although the KOA at Costanoa north of SC is quite nice and a great sand dune beach a short walk down from the campground.

 

yeah, in santa cruz and san mateo counties, there's pretty much only state park campgrounds. Butano and Portola SP's have always looked like neat places to camp but since I live here, I've never gone there.

if you want remote, what dman100 says... down highway 1 about 55 mile south of Carmel, just past Kirk Creek Campground, turn left up N-F road and go all the way to the top, take the south coast ridge road a few miles, then take a right off that to Prewitt Ridge, I believe its road 22S04, and there's a primitive NF dispersed camping area, no water, no pit toilets, nada. pack it in pack it out. 3300' elevation and a nearly straight drop to the ocean with breathtaking views. This spot is popular as a launching area for hang gliders and extreme downhill mountain bikers.

https://www.google.com/maps/dir/35....32,1383a,20y,41.11t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m2!4m1!3e0

the road there can be rather treacherous if its muddy, but if you have a 4wd taco with decent tires, you'll be fine.

 

does KOA have a website or anything? I wanna check it out since Im in SC may 6-9 and wanna camp it out in my rtt

 

KOA is mostly a big-RV campground, if you're small-truck camping, I'd consider the campground at Manressa Beach State Park, or if you want to be north of S'Cruz, check out Portola S.P or Butano S.P, these are both lesser known parks on the western flanks of the santa cruz mountains, roughly near Pescadero.

 

sweet! Id be able to camp it out at these places? roughly how far form the ucsc pool area would you say? This is for a water polo tournament haha but Im too cheap for hotel

 

both places booked may 7-9

 

There's also Henry Cowell right up the street from me, and Big Basin which is up past Boulder Creek. both state parks also.

but yeah, May is getting into prime season, these all book up months in advance.

 

oh, and lesser known, at Big Basin, there's Little Basin, which is a very cool campground, thats about 30 mins from Santa Cruz.

 

hey, little basin has 3 tent-only sites available may 6-9

 

its saying I need 4 people when there is only two. Ill just put four huh

 

lied said it was 4 people and got it!

 

Little Basin is a nice little campground, most of it is heavily forested. it was originally the Hewlett Packard company family camp but when Compaq borged HP, they neglected then divested it, it ended up in the hands of the local land trust, who got it back into adequate condition that Big Basin State Park would annex it, and found a 'outdoor school' group to operate it as a concessionaire so there'd be no costs to the park.

It does have some strict rules, absolutely no smoking anywhere, and no alcohol.

I'm an active member of the Santa Cruz Astronomy Club, we go up there one saturday a month and put on a star party with our telescopes after the saturday night campfire program. However, May 7th, we'll be at Henry Cowell SP instead (and I'll be in Reno).

 

That's awesome to know! You don't think they'll mind me lying about how many people there aren't? I've been going to Santa Cruz every year for a long time. My uncle has a place by sea bright on Texas street. I love SC and all the redwoods! I was there when I got 2nd in the nation for water polo with SDSU and now my gf and her team is taking their shot at the title so that's why I'm going up yet again. I'll be in big sur may 18th too

 

they setup Little Basin officially as a 'group campground' but the demand for large groups has been way down so they opened it up to individual campsites... no, they won't go around counting heads

hmmm, from UCSC, google says Little Basin is 52-55 minutes, about 25 miles. funny, it never seems that long when *I* drive there, muahaahahaha (ok, I'm a lunatic on narrow mountain roads). the empire grade -> jamison creek rd -> big basin -> little basin route is a totally scenic all narrow very twisty back road kinda route. graham hill -> 9 -> 236 -> little basin rd is probably the 'saner' way if you're not big on twisty roads.

both routes https://goo.gl/tSNOCo

 

huh, where's Texas St. ??!? I go to the seabright area quite often, and don't recognize that one. Now, a sunny afternoon, Seabright Brewery's patio, a pint (or pitcher, hah!) of Sacralicious, and a spinach salad with blackened salmon, mmMMMmmM!

 

James! Sorry my dad is from Texas and his name is Texas. Lol it's like 4 blocks up from Betty's burgers

 

walking distance to Seabright Brewery

 

LeftCoastNerd, this is awesome, I need more places to camp other than going to Tahoe every year lol

 

Exactly!