Oak Grove Campground — Hotel in Valley Center

This post is for my experience during my stay the weekend of 04/23 - 04/25. This was my first time staying at this facility so I had no idea which campsites were better than others. My first impression is the drive itself. I was coming from Orange County and traveling with my dog on the 15 south. Getting here was pretty easy and there were no confusing signs. I stayed at campsite 49 which is part of the Robinwood Loop. This campground has 2 loops, Oak Loop and Robinwood. The difference between the 2 loops is one has flush toilets (Robinwood) and one has vault toilets (Oak). My campsite was a decent size and located to a group site which was pretty full the weekend I was there. Noise wasn't too much of a factor and our pets had plenty of room to run around. Each site has a fire pit with a partial metal grate for open fire cooking, a separate charcoal style grill, and a large picnic table. Our site was big enough to fit 2 cars and the land itself was pretty flat. I make it a habit to walk the campgrounds to look for the nearest bathrooms, the trash cans, and to take a look at the other campsites for any future visits. The bathrooms were clean with plenty of TP. There was no lights at night so I advise bringing a lamp for those late night trips. Is there water available? YES there is!! Plenty of water spigots for your water needs. The camp sites are all well labeled and there are a few camp sites I'd recommend for future trips. If you're travelling in a group, book camp sites 59 and 61. They have plenty of shade and an awesome looking wood stove. Even if you're not travelling in a group but want a lot of space to "stretch" book these. I'll let the pictures do the talking. BTW, at night you can hear the coyotes howling in the surrounding mountains. The coyotes were pretty close by 10pm and according to one of my friends, she swears one was sniffing around her tent. Do I recommend this campground? Yes, I do. If you're traveling with family, you'll enjoy it. The bathrooms are clean, there is plenty of water, dog friendly, and the camp sites are level. I didn't see the camp host the entire weekend but that wasn't a deal breaker. Bring firewood with you because I don't think they sell any onsite. Major shopping center is about 20 minutes away from here. Cell service is limited to just being able to make calls and receive text...

We stayed in site 39. It is one of the larger single sites, and had plenty of space for a couple of larger tents. But the downfall is it connects to 3 of the 4 nearby sites going right next to our tent so we had other guests who had those sites reserved walking through our site with their dogs that would bark at us as they walked by just next to our tent.

Coyotes are active and loud and the dogs in the campground would join in with the howling. The campground was like party central over the weekend, so it was loud each night until 2-3 am with car alarms going off for 20-30 mins in the middle of the night each of the nights we were there.

And in July the little bit of shade is not enough to get a break from the heat. The flush bathrooms were on the dirty side, and I was thankful we brought our own toilet paper as it spent a day with 2 of the 3 stalls out of TP. Our site had tons of red ants, and it looked like others did as well, but we had no bites.

Now if you can get past all of that. The stars are gorgeous on a clear night, even with a nearly full moon. The camp host is friendly and helpful. And the general store 5 mins away has everything you might had forgotten at home. the grounds were kept clean with plenty of water faucets (which is good because some people were running hoses and sprinklers at some of them) and dumpsters. bugs were not bad for a campground at all. No mosquitos were to be found, and flies were only active for a little while at both...

I watched huge meteors streaking across the sky from Oak Grove Campgrounds last week for this year’s Perseids ✨⭐️🌙 We had the campgrounds mostly to ourselves as only 5 sites out of 81 were occupied during our 3 days stay. It was rare and amazing to have that space. I was really worried about the heat, but it was not as bad as I imagined for the 2nd week of August. With the shade from the oak trees and the wind moving breezes through Warner Springs, we were okay. It was still upwards of 95F HOT🔥🔥🔥 between 10A-5P, but this trip was about the night. As twilight approached and the air cooled, we got the campfire going in the pit that each site comes with and cooked all our meals over fire and coals. It was awesome. There was also a potable water spigot for every 3 sites or so. We watched the crescent moon rise early, then set to make way for the breathtaking stars that emerged as light faded. Amazing is way understated. We listened to crickets and coyotes, scrub jays, magpies, sheep, cows and a cockadoodledoo rooster. Rick the camp host was friendly and available for questions and recommendations. Wish we’d brought some board games. I had no service out there but it was nice to unplug... I have to remember to download books, audio and movies before trips. We didn’t need it, but there is a convenience store just 10 mins from...