Gold Lake Campground — Hotel in Portola

I havent ever posted a review for campground because usually it's a pleasant experience. However, this time it was a poor experience mostly due to the host. I don't know his name but he is an old guy with a long beard. When i first pulled in to check out available sites, there was a truck with boat blocking the campsites near the water. I had to back out and the host came out of his trailer. I explained the camping was blocked and he didn't do anything about it. So I decided to go look at other sites up on the hill instead. The campsites are near each other and you can easily hear other people. The bathrooms smelled so bad I couldn't even go in to use them. Then around 5am I woke up to a loud truck that was pumping water out of gold lake. I tried to go back to sleep. Then a short while later the camp host came on his bike and looking around my campsite. I woke up frightened on why he was there. He told me I had to pay in the envelope which I did shortly after parking the night before.. Never had I ever had a host come to my campsite and demand payment when he didn't even look at all the paid envelopes. It left a bad experience. I won't be returning because of him and the way gold lake is being run. There is scrap timber and glass around the lake so it's not even worth taking a stroll to visit. Plus they charge 10 for day use. Your better off exploring the other...

Almost 5 stars. The location is amazing. The temps were comfortable while Nevada and Calf are baking. The lake too is wonderful. No cell service another plus if you want to disconnect. But the place needs attention. Roads are terrible, the main drive down has one real bad spot. The lake side dirt 'road' is nothing more than one long pot hole with boulders in it, a car is barely able to survive one pass without dragging the bottom.

The few porta potty are swapped out on Mondays. So they will be nasty and full on the weekends, good luck with that. The toilet at the boat launch needs to be cleaned more often and I'm guessing the camp host isn't really doing his job. I don't think he really knows what sites are what, nor really cares. Seemed friendly, just doesn't seem to give a rats as*.

A depth map of the lake would be nice. The east side seems to have bouys for rocks and south near the islands looks like all rocks too. I couldn't find anything online though. Good crawdad fishing since the bottom is all...

Nice lake, 4 wheel trails good, it is a dry camp with out houses. At the time the host was doing some funny business switching reserved sites and first come sites, made for confusing and angry situations. Seemed the powers above had taken care of the problem. Big negative is if you bring an off road toy, the rangers make you keep on a trailer or you must leave it at the staging area. Stupidest thing ever. If you travel with a toy hauler your stuff is left overnight unattended. Policy needs to be changed. Also the no campfire rules are out of hand in development campsite.... nice overall experience but will drycamp elsewhere until they...