Cotter Campground - bookings required — Hotel in District of Coree

A handy base camp to visit Canberra and surrounds but with the road only metres away from all sites, it’s not quiet.

This campground is large and has sites that suit caravans and camper trailers as well as tents. All trailer/caravan sites are to the right of the entry (ground surface is large gravel/loose road base). These make up about a quarter of the campground. Dedicated tent sites are defined by large granite boulders preventing cars from being driven up onto the grass. Each site has a fire pit suitable for cooking-on. (It’s BYO firewood. )

This campground has potable water at numerous locations through the ground (fixtures and locations suitable for filling caravans and camper trailers). It also has hot water and a couple of showers each in both male and female toilet blocks. (Showers turn-off automatically after 3.5mins and have a ‘blackout’ period of 2mins before they can be turned on again. ) Additionally there are a couple of washing up sinks and a deep laundry sink (with hot water taps) at the back of the toilet block.

Park rangers are present each day and very friendly. A noise curfew is in force between 10pm and 7am.

The river provides a lovely, relaxing soundscape at night. However, the nearness of this campground to the road means that light sleepers will be woken by traffic. Our experience was that the occasional car can be expected even at midnight on a weekday and weekday (wok) traffic begins from about 0530.

There are lots of kangaroos to be found grazing at dusk. Wombats are also around but we weren’t able to spot any.

This campground is popular with fishers and mountain bikers and makes a good base for these activities. It is situated in a gully so sunshine doesn’t reach camp until about 0930-1000 mid-Winter. Expect frosty tables, windscreens etc.

A last note—a fox has been known to visit the campground (as at Winter 2023) and enter tents in search of food. Bird life may also take food left unattended. Our car was damaged by a black rat attracted to the warm engine bay. Given our experience, I’d recommend that you chat to the ranger about current pests so that you’re prepared. (Rangers are receptive to reports of pests and appear to take...

This is camping in a packed out lay-by next to a rarely cleaned public toilet. $30 per night (2 adults) is ridiculously expensive for a campground that is not maintained. The facilities were not clean. We stayed 2 nights and it looked like someone had attempted to clean the toilets once. Maybe a quick toilet brush and a wipe around the toilet seat but missed all the dead flies on the lid and didn't attempt the floor. The ranger was not on site long enough to have cleaned properly and seemed more interested in chatting. I didn't use the showers as this seemed counter productive. The toilet blocks were overrun with bugs and spiders as no one is clearing away webs and mud nests which were on the cubicle doors. There were a lot of small pieces of litter in the grass some from the fire pits but most just from gross humans. The sites are unmarked which would be ok if they weren't so limited. Adequate space for tents, grass behind big rocks that stop cars going on the grass. Not many spots for roof tents. Limited room for caravans. You'd have some issues with where a trailer tent would go. Lots of the space is gravel road/carpark. Due to COVID you're supposed to book and pay online so they can restrict numbers. We did this, but given the amount of people there and some conversations I overheard I don't think many others did. The place was overrun and the rangers weren't checking who'd booked or payed. The adjacent road was quiet on Friday night when it was raining but on Saturday when the weather was fine there were groups of cars hooning well after midnight. This campground needs to be...

Great place with good access to the river to splash in. Only complaint is that it's too near the road and can be noisy at night depending on the road racers.

Tips for staying here Leave proof of booking on a piece of paper attached to your camp for the ranger to see. Plenty of potable water available. Can buy firewood from ranger. If he's not around, he may leave the firewood cage open so you can just take a bag and put the money in the box. $12 for 15kg. No internet at camp. You can go behind the amenities block and onto the road. Walk uphill 150m and you'll see a rocky topped small hill on the right side. Go up there and you can get 1 bar of hspa. Enough to download an email and not much else. I couldn't work out if generators can be used. Website says no but noticeboard says no generators after 10pm. Grey water can be disposed at laundry. Don't start fires on the ground. Use the built in firepits or bring your own firepit. Collecting...