Stargazing

Smiley Creek Lodge

6 RV Sites, 7 Cabins, 2 Yurts

Smiley Creek Lodge in Blaine County, Idaho, offers six full-hookup RV sites with 50-amp service and rigs accepted to 40 feet, alongside seven cabins and two yurts on the Sawtooth Scenic Byway. A lake, beach, and general store serve guests near Sun Valley and the Sawtooth National Recreation Area. Six back-in sites carry water, sewer, and electric on 50-amp service, sized to 40 feet — note that all sites are 50-amp, and the 40-foot cap suits mid-size rigs rather than the largest coaches. Seven cabins and two yurts round out the accommodations. A general store, laundry, restrooms, showers, and WiFi handle the practical side. With six RV sites, reserve well ahead. Pets are welcome. A lake and creek run near the property with a beach for swimming, and canoeing, kayaking, paddle boarding, boating, and fishing all available. Hiking, biking, and stargazing run from the site, with a playground for families and live music through the season. Wine and beer tasting is nearby. The byway position is the advantage. This is one of the most scenically extraordinary mountain routes in the American West, where the Wood River Valley's cottonwood corridors open into the granite peaks and alpine lakes of the Sawtooths. The lodge gives the most direct access to the Sawtooth Wilderness trail network and the Stanley Basin's fly fishing on the upper Salmon. Directions: from the north, drive 22 miles south from Stanley on Highway 75; from the south, 37 miles north from Ketchum. Summer is the season at this elevation. Reserve well ahead.

from $100/night

Trinity View Resort

67 RV Sites, 10 Tent Sites

Trinity View is great for families and group events. You’ll love our incredible views and relaxing atmosphere. Come swim, play miniature golf, disc golf with us, or fish or boat nearby. Use our scenic walking trail or set up for a night of stargazing under a spectacular Idaho night sky. We are in sight of Little Camas Reservoir with seasonal fishing, kayak, or canoeing, and within 20 minutes from the boat launch at Anderson Reservoir and the south fork of the Boise River, with some of the best fishing in Idaho. So bring your boat and friends, lots of true Idaho recreation to be found here.

from $30/night

Goose Creek RV Park & Campground

19 RV Sites

On the Columbia Plateau in the Big Bend country of north-central Washington, Goose Creek RV Park & Campground offers a well-positioned overnight and extended-stay option in the small community of Wilbur—just under 19 miles from the shores of Lake Roosevelt and the engineering spectacle of Grand Coulee Dam. Open year-round with full hookups, cabin rentals, laundry, and on-site dining, the park provides a complete stop for rigs of every configuration traveling the eastern Washington plateau country, and its walkable distance to downtown Wilbur's restaurants and shops adds a genuine small-town dimension to the overnight experience. Full hookup sites with city water, sewer, and 15/30/50-amp electrical service accommodate travelers of every type, and the spacious layout gives even large rigs room to settle in comfortably. Cabin rentals are available for guests who prefer not to set up, and a 24-hour laundromat handles the practical demands of travelers who've been on the road for multiple days. WiFi is available throughout the property, and the on-site restaurant provides a dining option without requiring a separate stop. Golf cart rentals and bike rentals offer guests additional ways to explore the grounds and the surrounding town. The park's year-round operation makes it accessible across all seasons of the eastern Washington landscape. The Columbia Plateau surrounding Wilbur is a landscape of extraordinary visual character that is dramatically underappreciated by travelers who push through eastern Washington on I-90 without veering into the plateau's interior. Vast wheat fields roll across basalt bench lands, punctuated by rimrock canyon walls and sagebrush draws that define the Columbia Basin. Night skies here are among the darkest in Washington State, and stargazing from the campground can produce a Milky Way experience that brings campers back for specifically astronomical reasons. The bird life of the plateau—raptors, meadowlarks, long-billed curlews, and migrating waterfowl—rewards even casual observation throughout the year. Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area, formed by the Grand Coulee Dam on the Columbia River, is the primary outdoor destination for guests. The lake stretches 150 miles through the Columbia River canyon and offers swimming, boating, fishing, camping, and access to the Fort Spokane and Kettle Falls historic areas along its shore. Grand Coulee Dam itself—one of the most significant engineering projects in American history and the largest hydroelectric facility in the United States when completed—operates free public tours and presents a daily summer laser light show projected onto its face that draws visitors from across the region. Goose Creek RV Park & Campground is open year-round and serves an interesting combination of guests: travelers in transit across the Columbia Plateau, outdoor recreationists using Wilbur as a Lake Roosevelt base camp, and hunters and anglers working the region's productive upland game and fishing territory. A casino and golf course in the area provide additional entertainment options. The park's combination of full services, year-round operation, and proximity to Lake Roosevelt makes it a logical stop that rewards guests who take the time to explore the Big Bend country. Book a site and discover what the Columbia Plateau has been hiding.

from $42/night

Rest in Peace RV Park

In Sagle, Idaho—in Bonner County on US-95 ten miles south of Sandpoint where Lake Pend Oreille's 148-square-mile surface, 1,150-foot depth, and the surrounding Selkirk and Cabinet Mountains create the most dramatic freshwater lake setting in the inland Pacific Northwest, and the Schweitzer Mountain Resort's 2,900 feet of vertical skiing, the Sandpoint arts community, and Priest Lake's remote northern wilderness create the four-season outdoor destination that the northern Idaho Panhandle's most complete recreational landscape provides—Rest in Peace RV Park offers 17 full hookup RV sites on 5 acres with 30 and 50-amp service, water, and sewer, an outdoor pool, walking trails, sports courts, a dog park, a dump station, and showers with gated access and WiFi, all positioned within minutes of Lake Pend Oreille's boating and paddleboarding, 19 miles from Silverwood Theme Park, and at the base of the Sandpoint recreation corridor. Lake Pend Oreille is minutes away. Schweitzer is up the mountain. The name is memorable. The 17 full hookup sites on 5 US-95 acres—30 and 50-amp electric, water, sewer, and WiFi on a gated property with dump station, showers, sports courts, dog park, outdoor pool, and walking trails—provide the functional small-park infrastructure in Bonner County's lakeside corridor at the intersection of the Lake Pend Oreille recreation economy and the US-95 north-south travel route connecting Sandpoint to Coeur d'Alene. The outdoor pool, sports courts, and walking trails create the on-property recreation that the non-lake afternoon and the non-Schweitzer morning complement with the lake and ski access that the park's location provides within a short drive. The dog park and pet-friendly environment serve the outdoor travel culture's companion animal infrastructure in a region where trails and wilderness areas are fundamental to the Bonner County lifestyle. Sagle sits in Bonner County at the southern base of the Sandpoint peninsula, on the US-95 corridor between Sandpoint and Coeur d'Alene where Lake Pend Oreille's southern bays—Bottle Bay, Garfield Bay, and the Trestle Creek area—provide the kayaking, stand-up paddleboarding, and shore fishing access that the lake's southern end creates at quieter water levels than the Sandpoint marinas' boat traffic. Lake Pend Oreille's 1,150-foot depth makes it one of the five deepest lakes in the United States—the Navy's Acoustic Research Detachment has operated submarine-scale testing on the lake since World War II, using the depth and freshwater clarity for underwater acoustic research that the classified Cold War testing history made the lake genuinely consequential in naval defense. Sandpoint, 10 miles north on US-95, provides the Bonner County resort town's complete activity infrastructure—the Festival at Sandpoint's outdoor summer concert series, the Pend d'Oreilles Winery's tasting room on Cedar Street, the Schweitzer Mountain Resort's 2,900-foot vertical on Schweitzer Mountain Road, and the City Beach's Lake Pend Oreille swimming create the Sandpoint experience that the northern Idaho outdoor recreation community has built into one of the Pacific Northwest's most recognized small resort cities. Silverwood Theme Park, 19 miles south on US-95 near Athol, provides the Pacific Northwest's largest amusement and water park with roller coasters, water slides, and family rides across 75 acres. Rest in Peace RV Park operates seasonally through the northern Idaho outdoor calendar, with the lake's boating season from May through September, the Schweitzer ski and snowboard season from December through March, and the fall color in the Selkirk and Cabinet mountain forests from late September through mid-October creating the three primary activity periods that the Sagle corridor's four-season appeal sustains. Reserve your site at Rest in Peace RV Park and let the name, the Lake Pend Oreille proximity, and Schweitzer's vertical deliver the northern Idaho Panhandle adventure that Bonner County's most memorably named campground provides.

from $65/night