Pacific Northwest Camping

The Complete Guide to Tent and RV Camping in Washington and Oregon

12th Edition
By: Tom Stienstra
Series: Moon Outdoors
ISBN 1640498680
Pages: 704
Price: $24.95 US
Published: June 2018
The Pacific Northwest’s legendary and only complete camping guide

Top-selling outdoors writer Tom Stienstra covers the adventures of camping in the Pacific Northwest, including notable campsites along the Olympic Peninsula and Washington Coast, as well as the Southern Cascades, Mount Rainier, and the Columbia River Gorge. Stienstra provides easy-to-follow maps with driving directions to each campground, along with camping options from secluded alpine hike-ins to convenient roadside stop-overs. Complete with details on what to pack, what to wear, reservations, fees, and the best camping facilities, Moon Pacific Northwest Camping gives travelers the tools they need to create a more personal and memorable camping experience.

We have made it a personal mission to win your trust and put the best of the Pacific Northwest’s great outdoors in the palms of your hands with this book.

In this mission to make Pacific Northwest Camping your book of choice, we started by incorporating the information collected over the course of 25 years of roaming around the West as full-time outdoors writers. We then faxed out 700 pages of galley proofs to more than 100 rangers and recreation specialists at field offices, as well as to the owners of each privately owned and operated park. In the process, each word of every page has been reviewed by three or four specialists, with hundreds of people involved in polishing the final product.
We wrote this book for several reasons. The first reason was simple: We never wanted to get stuck again for the night without a spot. That is why we searched them out. In the end, that is the best public value of the book: You will never get stuck for the night again. With this book, your days of being a prisoner of hope are over.

Another reason was that our publisher found that other guidebooks available were extremely incomplete, loaded with mistakes, and often included directions to destinations that were simply wrong or incoherent. If you have an old edition of Pacific Northwest Camping, for instance, throw it on your campfire because thousands of changes have been made since that book was first published. A lot of other books out there deserve a far less honorable fate.

We have written every direction in the book as if a person in the passenger seat is reading to the person who is driving. Compare the directions and maps in this book with anything else out there, and this feature alone can make Pacific Northwest Camping your book of choice.

One note is that in every case, the prices listed for each campground were provided to us for the 2010 season. Over the course of seasons and years, prices increase. Count on it. If price is a bottom-line concern, call the contact number listed before planning your visit.

We also wrote this book because many of the most beautiful places on earth are in Washington. When our families and friends heard we were writing this book, some were outraged. They feared that all of their favorite spots would be revealed to all. After reviewing the manuscript, though, they’ve decided we’re all right, after all. They have discovered, as we have, that Washington is filled with beautiful, little-used campgrounds that are perfect jumping-off points for adventures–and they represent hundreds of outstanding destinations, in addition to their sprinkling of favorites.

Some of the highlights of this book include:

• Over 650 campgrounds, featuring national forests; local, county, state, and national parks; land managed by the Department of Natural Resources; and privately owned and operated parks
• Thousands of detailed updates and upgrades from anything previously published
• 45 extremely detailed maps
• Directions that are the easiest to use (and that have been fact-checked) of any outdoor book in the state
• Detailed and fact-checked information about each camp’s setting, facilities, fees, reservation policies, and nearby recreation
• Helpful and anecdotal information about how to put the fun into every trip, including tips on catching fish, dealing with bears, and finding the best camp tents, bags, food, water purifiers, and more
• Icons that quickly identify activities at each camp
• Individually confirmed and reviewed telephone numbers

As guidebook authors, we get tons of emails and read each one carefully. These comments have often been beneficial. In the process, we have incorporated dozens of suggestions from readers to make this the book they want it to be. Your comments are always welcome and appreciated.

As you might have realized, this is not a hobby for us, as it is for some part-time writers who publish books. This is our full-time job. Because we spend 150 days a year in the field, traveling an average of 40,000 miles per year, we understand how seriously people take their fun, what they need to know to make their trips work, and their underlying fears of getting stuck for the night without a spot.

Our advice is to never go anywhere in the Pacific Northwest without this new book on your front seat! See you out there!

                        –Tom Stienstra

          Feel great in the next 24 hours: Hike. Bike. Camp. Fish. Boat. Wildlife watch. Explore.