Arroyo Seco Campground — Hotel in Greenfield

Went here with a group looking to camp at the first come first serve sites and they turned us away saying "all campsites were full" when they absolutley weren't. The staff there acted like rude club bouncers instead of park employees. I drove about 10mins ahead of my group in a separate car, and when I got there the staff at the entrance kiosk let me in to the campground without a problem. I drove in and tried to find the camp host, couldn't find her so I scoped out the campsites since I hadn't been there before. The vast majority of the campground was empty, and all tags on first come first serve campsites said reservations ended that day. There was more than enough space for a group of 6.

I then drove back to the entrance kiosk to see if the staff there could help me find the camp host, and found my friends had arrived. They had been told the campground was full. The staff at the kiosk claimed they hadn't let anyone in in the past 30 minutes - even though they had just let me in without any issues. I talked with the staff at the entrance kiosk and told them the campground is mostly empty, but they refused to let us in and continued to claim campsite was full. They refused to let me talk to the camp host or drive back in, and yelled at my friends for parking in the 15-minute visitor zone while they waited for me. After about 5 minutes of back and forth I decided to drop it -- it was clear they didn't want us there for whatever reason.

Not sure what's going on here, but whatever rules the staff here claim to be following are not first-come-first-serve...

It's a nice campsite in a beautiful setting. They have 2 types of sites - modern and primitive. We stayed at the primitive campsite, where there are only vault toilets (no toilet paper at the time of our visit) and water. Lots of yellow jackets there!!!! We came mostly because of the opportunity to swim. There are 2 possible places to swim (neither of those are the lakes you see on the campsite map, both places are on the river). One is the day-use area close to the entrance to the campsite. It has picnic tables, grills and a vast parking lot. However, this place gets very crowded on weekends, so it might fill up. If you camp here, you have to leave the car at your campsite and walk back down or pay extra for the day-use area parking (10 dollars). The other one is the gorge. You have to walk to the trail-head (it will be closer from the modern campsite) and then hike about 2 miles. The road is wide and it's an easy walk, until you see a small path leading down towards the river. Here it gets much steeper, at one point there is a rope to help you get down/up. Nothing too difficult, but as I had recently hurt my foot, it was a bit challenging for me. Might be difficult with very small children or lots of things to carry. The place is lovely and worth the hike. On weekends there are people working at the entrance, so you pay your fees there. We were leaving on Monday morning and then there were people having trouble finding where to pay for the day-use area. Seems like they could improve...

Clean campground. Allows dogs. Has bathroom facilities with flush toilets and separate coin operated showers. (6 quarters for the first 5 minutes, 1 quarter for each additional minute). The showers have adequate pressure and water temps are comfortably warm/hot.

There are single, double, and group campsites as well as three walk-to campsites which isn't that far from where you park your car. There are water spigots close to each campsite.

There is no cell reception so make sure you have what you need before heading in. The campground is approximately 45 minutes from the town of Greenfield. There's a pay phone but the coin slot to the phone that was close to where we were wasn't accepting coins. If you do need basic supplies like firewood and ice, the camp host has those items for sale. $7 for a bundle of wood and $5 for a bag of ice. The camp host was pleasant and went around daily to make sure everything was ok.

Aside from a couple loud groups, the campgrounds were quiet at night.

There are lots of bugs that will bite so make sure you bring some type of deterrent. Deet, citronella, etc..There were tons of biting flies when we were there, and personally, I think their bites are worse than mosquitoes.

There are hiking and biking trails. Most folks will play in the Arroyo Seco River and hike/swim the gorge. There are plenty of swimming holes along the river but if you want to see the slot canyon and the small waterfall, you'll have to hike/swim several...