Lava Hot Springs West KOA Holiday — Hotel in Lava Hot Springs

We made so many memories here, we stayed 6 nights. We were saddened when the time came to leave. We’ve stayed at both KOA east & KOA west every year. Koa west is by far the best & best location period. This location is the best for tubing the river. Once you head down the river & your camping at koa west along the river u can ride all the way down & get out at your campsite. We rented tubes & just shuttled ourselves to the top & drove back to camp after dropping off & the family went down the river. I was waiting at camp for them to come down again & we loaded up once again. Super easy get out & take breaks at camp. Especially when u can float right to it. The staff were super welcoming & constantly cleaning & maintaining the property. Throughout our 6 day stay we seen them now almost everyday. They were on top of everything. The koa store has everything & anything u need for supplies from clothes, swim suits, water shoes & even rv equipment. We forgot our water pressure regulator because we bought a new hose & left the old one behind. They have everything u need to make u feel at home. Downside to this property!!! Sold out 1 year in advance regularly. Yes there’s a train, it doesn’t matter where u stay in lava!!! The train can be herd everywhere. Also please keep an eye on your young ones, I seen numerous super young kids playing alone by the river, Don’t leave your kids alone There’s also no More jumping pad, closed due to insurance prices. Also no More taco bus on the campground, the owners who own the campground & the taco truck are the same & have moved across the street into a physical building. Now it’s an actual restaurant. Downside is it’s only open usually Fri, Saturday, Sunday. We were bummed the whole week. But we understand because it’s usually dead during the week. They also don’t rent tubes at the koa anymore u must go to a stand. They usually refer you to gator rentals. But there actually a cheaper more affordable stand in the pool parking lot next to the koa. They charge $14 for the full day rental on a single tube or $7 for 2hrs. Double tubes are $28 for the full day. There is also a koa member who walks the property on the weekends all night to maintain the quiet levels. Super friendly guy...

We do a big Lava trip every year and usually stay in this campground. We love that it’s so close to the hotel hot spring pools, the market, and most of the town shops and restaurants. If you can get a camping spot in the shade and by the river then it’s absolutely perfect. However, there are some issues, especially this year.

I stayed in one of the cabins this year with 3 other people. The shower was pretty gross and the beds weren’t that comfortable. We also had to wipe everything down ourselves which makes me think they don’t clean anything for the next stay. That wouldn’t be a big deal if the cabins were less expensive. However we will be staying at a hotel next year for around the same price and we won’t have to bring our own bedding and towels and we’ll know the room will be clean.

The biggest issue we had this year was how we were treated by the night campground manager. We were starting a fire in our pit and just chatting when he came up in his golf cart to yell at us. Not once. Not twice. 3-4 times. We were speaking at a normal volume, not playing any music, and other campgrounds were being louder than us. For some reason he just had it out for us. Even asking if we were setting off fireworks?! No sir, we were not. There was no boom or anything so not sure where that came from. He then called the sheriff to come talk to us. The deputy said “sorry about this, when I get called I have to make contact but I can see you guys are not being a problem. This isn’t the first time I’ve had a call from him about this.” So this guy is yelling at guests and bothering the sheriffs office for no reason. Again, pretty much the whole campground was our friends and family and they all told us they didn’t hear anything from us that night.

We’ve had problems in the past with the staff not really knowing how to work their computer system. Not really a big deal, it usually works out in the end, it’s just frustrating in the moment.

I’ll no longer give this campground my money, which is a shame because I really do like camping by the river. It’s just not...

We stayed in the new 2 bedroom cabins. We’ve stayed in the deluxe 1 bedroom cabins before, and in comparison we were pretty disappointed in our experience with the new ones. At the time we booked early summer and up until our stay in July there were no photos up of the cabin, just the floor plan. I called to ask for photos but was told they wouldn’t be able to send me any. I decided to keep the reservation hoping the cabin would be similar to the deluxe ones we had booked in the last. When we arrived I was surprised to see how close the cabins are placed next to each other. There is no barrier between you and your neighbor, and essentially no privacy if both parties are hanging out outside. They do have some plants there and it seems like when those grow that might help with more separation. The cabin itself was not very clean, there were ants, insects in the tub and a lot of dust which makes me doubt how thoroughly it gets cleaned between guests. I was surprised to find that the bathrooms don’t come with any hand soap, no trash cans, and no paper towels. When we have stayed in the deluxe cabins they include all of those extras. They did include a small bottle of dish soap, and when I called the office to ask about the hand soap and paper towels they confirmed it is not included, and only the deluxe cabins get those extra supplies. They did however try to accommodate us and brought a small trash can and a roll of paper towels and one extra toilet paper roll to our cabin. I will say the beds in the bedrooms were much more comfortable than the deluxe cabins, however the futon was extremely uncomfortable as the padding is not even throughout and has a large dip right where your hip lays. The staff were very kind and friendly, and did a great job helping us. The overall quality of what you get compared to the high cost (about $300 for a weeknight) does not feel worth it. Sadly we won’t be staying here again and will opt for air B&B in the future to get better value...