Location / Name: Stillwater Campground (USFS), Granby, CO

Date: 08/26/2016 (1 night)

Stillwater Campground is a US Forestry Service campground on Lake Granby, after you exit the Rocky Mountains National Park on US 34, our planned route. I wasn’t sure how far I’d travel the next day, but this positioned us nicely for a push on toward Moab, and made for a reasonable travel distance through the park so we could take our time enjoying the views. This was one of only 2 reservations I made prior to starting on our trip. A good thing, the campground was full when we arrived; not unexpected for the start of a weekend. This was our favorite campground, not only because it is a nice campground (which it is) but also because of the majestic surroundings.

General description of park/area:

Rocky Mountains National Park is a showcase of American majesty northwest of Denver, CO. It’s also north and west of Boulder (we had a pleasant breakfast at Pekoe Sip House), and west of Estes Park, cities we drove through on our way into the park. The drive through the park was amazing on that beautiful August day – even in August we got some snow in the highest areas. We reached 12,090’ on our way over the Rockies. The long descent lead us to Lake Granby, a few miles outside the park, where Stillwater Campground is located. This is a beautiful location for a campground, set from waterside up to a hill well above the lake where views in all directions were breathtaking.

General description of campground:

The Stillwater campground is a US Forestry Service facility with a somewhat unusual feature for USFS campgrounds – electricity at many (20) sites. There are also over 80 sites without electricity – some set up for RVs; some tent-only. It is in a beautiful settings just a few miles outside the west entrance to the Rocky Mountains National Park. It is on a hill (both sides and the top) in a peninsula sticking out into the large, man-made Lake Granby, a few miles from the town of Granby, CO. The sites are mostly spacious, and they are clean and well-appointed. In parts of the campground they are a bit close together, and due to the nature of the area, there are no trees or shrubs between sites(on Facebook Jay Rogers noted that the campground used to be covered in pines, but they were killed by the pine bark beetle), so there is little privacy, but the sites are positioned well, and with the hillsides many of the picnic tables are down the hill slightly from the driveway, so a small sense of privacy can be found there. The majestic views of the lake and mountains, and the generous distance between most sites, outweigh any privacy issues to me. The bathrooms are clean and nice.

Access: There should be no problems with access into the campground; some of the sites might require watchful maneuvering to get into.

Site: We stayed in Site #21, a back-in about halfway up the hill on the central driveway. The site driveway was long enough to back my T@b into the site, disconnect, and move the car forwards a bit while staying within the driveway. The driveway was level side to side – good thing which helped with quick setup, because there was a COLD wind blowing with some rain as I set up; my hands felt frozen before I was done. The picnic table and fire pit are down a small set of steps from the driveway, and out of the back of the site was a path to a bathhouse serving the sites on our side of the hill.

Electric: I don’t recall using an adapter at our site (almost certain that I didn’t), but the recreation.gov website only shows 15-amp service. I’m pretty sure I connected to 30-amp service, and used my basic analyzer/surge protector, with the 30-amp circuit passed the tests. I did turn on our Alde heater briefly, on electric and not on propane.

Water: Water connections are available at RV campsites, a few feet back of the electric pedestal on the back-in driver’s side (correct side) of the site. I didn’t use it.

Bathhouse: There are a number of bathhouses serving the 107 sites in the campground. Some have only cold water sinks, urinals, and toilets, but are clean and functional. Once again, government facility with no hand soap. There are showers available in one or two of the bathhouses; I didn’t know this until on our way out, so we didn’t use the showers.

Sewer: There is a dump station near the exit, one of the nicest ones I’ve used. This was our first dump of our 6-gallon black tank on the trip out.

Cell Phone Service: Excellent Verizon cell service and 4G hotspot service. I was surprised due to the location, but since the area seems to be quite a tourist destination, I guess it makes sense that Verizon has a tower nearby.

Trash disposal: Dumpsters are located throughout the campground.

Cost: $28 for my water/electric site. There was a $9 reservation fee (which would be spread over multiple days if you’re staying more than one), and an $11 discount for my Senior America the Beautiful Pass, so we paid $26 for our night in this beautiful campground. Given the opportunity, I’d stay a week or more – a week would come out to just over $18 per night, a real deal. Maybe someday…

Supplies/Food: The campground is a few miles from Granby, and there are stores between the campground and Granby where supplies can be obtained. Restaurants are also nearby. Remember, “tourist destination.”

T@b Note:

The trip from Denver over the continental divide in the Rocky Mountains National Park to Stillwater Campground towing our T@b was relatively short – 119 miles. The drive up to the top drove our mileage down below 9 MPG, but the long downhill from 12,000’ to about 8,000’ brought it back up to 14.2 for the day. The temperature dropped to 32 degrees overnight – the prior evening’s scattered showers left a frozen windshield in the morning – but we stayed nice and warm (too warm, I turned the heat off entirely after a couple of hours) in our T@b.