Kyen Campground & Oak Grove Day Use Area

Do not come here until May! DON’T EVEN CONSIDER IT! I DID NOT FEEL SAFE. This place was full of homeless people and truth be told 98% of them were just fine. However, one guy was raging/​ranting all night. Homicidal ideation, breaking branches and banging on someone’s tent, lots of expletives, and descriptions on how he was going to kill people. His verbal abuse was directed at people he appeared to know and not at outright strangers. However, we were not able to get any sleep. It’s also not ideal to pack up camp in the middle of the night and where were we gonna go anyways? So, we just endured the rage/​rants. On the plus side, the park ranger came by in the morning and sincerely apologized and stayed with us while we packed up our things. He seemed pretty distressed that we had endured that kind of a situation.
I would have called the police had I had cell phone service. Coming here would have been a complete disaster if I had children with me.

We came to this campground around august of last year (yeah this review is pretty late), but I wanted to share our experience. That was our fourth or fifth time staying there, and we never really had problems before, but last year was definitely our last time camping at this location. First of all, there was no one at the front office when we got there, which was around 1 or 2 pm. I don’t think I ever saw anyone there during my last stay there. There are many homeless people with mental problems walking around; we saw one by our tents in the middle of the night just watching us so we kept one person up at night just to keep watch from then on. One traveling homeless family put their tent up next to ours one night (without a reservation of course), but they seemed nice so we didn’t think much of it. Then we noticed them taking some of our things so we asked them to leave to another site. TO TOP THINGS OFF, we had two encounters with snakes. The first time we saw a snake by the water, which we just ignored. The second time, the snake was under my aunts chair on our campsite, and we had to ask her not to move to get the (HUGE) snake away from her.

My friends and I had a really bad experience last night and I hope the situation changes. Apparently this facility accepted dozens of homeless people after a nearby encampment was disbanded. That’s not a problem, except some of these folks have mental problems and one in particular was in a delusional rant all night, spewing cuss words and making violent verbal attacks against people in the camp. It was really scary and also kept us from sleeping.
To be fair, the ranger came to us in the morning and was really nice about everything and filed a police report. But I’d prefer if there was more of a ranger or security presence at night.

We made reservations for August, the middle of summer. Yet when we arrived at the campground there was no one there to help, in fact there was no one around at all. We did pass a few tents but no RVs. We finally found our site on the map. We drove to our site pulling a 26 foot trailer, which I did say that we had, and it was horrible. The drive to the site was not made for RVs and the site it self was extremely narrow and you had to drive downhill to be able to back into it up hill. We did not even try. Driving out of the loop was difficult with trees almost hitting the top of the trailer and then poor markings on the road caused us to have to back up the length of the truck and trailer so we could then go the right way. We stopped in the boat lot to walk our dogs and heard fighting and drinking going on and again no park personnel was a round. Needless to say we lost our money but we felt it was safer to spend the night on the road then there.

It’s not bad. It’s more like car camping in place of using a cheap motel, which is exactly what I used it for when going to a friends’ party in the area. The showers had a powerful flow and free. There was a pit in every spot I saw. It’s mostly shady which is important in the hot Mendo sun. Otherwise, it’s not that pretty and the lake is low due to the drought.
My biggest beef was with the neighbors who were seriously redneck and swearing and asking if we’d left when we were in the tent (but our car was down in the lot). They weren’t inappropriate enough to kick out, but they weren’t classy by any means.

It was my first ever camping experience and I enjoyed it a lot!
You can reach the camp using the coordinates «39°14’12“N, 123°10’40 ». We went there on the labor day weekend without a reservation. We called the phone number provided to us by ranger and booked the spot after reaching there. As expected, all the lake side spots were booked, but there were many spot available on the other side. Spots are close to each other, but not all the spots were booked, so it was easy to find an isolated spot for us.
We went to the lake side in the night where we could see the clear sky. It’s a good idea to take your chairs/​tarp and spend some time there watching the stars. We were lucky to see several meteoroids entering the atmosphere.
The place has good bathrooms and hot shower facilities.

First, Google maps and most GPS aps will take you to the wrong place. We spent an hour driving around in 100+ degree weather looking for the campsite. The campsite is on East 20, north of Ukiah on Marina drive.
We went there at the tail end of a 10 days road trip through northern california, and all the gorgeous beaches and redwood forests might have spoilt us, but this was by far the crappiest campground we’re seen. It was hot, dry, dusty and dirty. The campsites are way too close together and there are very few trees for shade, or to screen you from your super-​close neighbors. There were cigarette butts and empty beer bottles all over our campsite. There are tons of bugs, including wasps/​yellow jackets.
The crowd there seemed kind of rough — noisy and verging on drunk even at 7 in the evening. There were large loud family groups, a few monster trucks and enough rough and crass behavior to make us feel uncomfortable.
The heat/​bugs/​rough company was enough to make us pack up and do the 4 hour drive back home to the bay area rather than brave the night there.
Would not recommend this campground to anyone

The Lake Mendocino address is NOT the location of the campground! The campground is actually on Marina Dr. The Lake Mendocino address takes you to the Army Corps office.
Other than that, campground is fine. Bathrooms were decent, showers were lukewarm but free. Vegetation and general feel of the place was nothing special.

I’ve stayed at this campground twice and have enjoyed both of my stays. I prefer roughing it and I’m not much of a campground camper but this place is pretty good. The water front campsites are the best. They have free hot water showers, this place is dog friendly and close to town in case you forget something. Some of the campsites are small and pretty close together. There are 3 day use areas and area c is dog friendly. The fees are reasonable and the campers and rangers have been very friendly.

I have stayed at this campsite over 5 times. if you have the choice, stay on the side of the road closest to the lake.
Why you ask?
1. Sites are much more level for the most part.
2. If you have a boat you can both keep a closer eye on it and also save your lazy ass some walking.
WATCH OUT FOR POISON OAK!!! Its not an epidemic or anything, but it is most definitely there.

We stayed here during the second week of October. Very nice location but poorly maintained. Big sites, but since the land slants towards the lake it’s sometimes hard to find a level spot for a tent. Then there are the yellow jackets…

We stayed there again last weekend and Earl and his wife are top-​notch hosts. They were so polite and attentive and answered my questions with a friendly smile. The campsites are nice and always clean as well as nicely treed and private. The water is nice for swimming and warm in the summer. If you want to camp and relax this is a nice place. If you’re looking for sandy beaches where kids can play and you can lay down, this is not the place. It’s just sharp gravel with plenty of goose poop. The beach is not cleaned so geese crap everywhere and it just dries out in the sun. Wear shoes right to the water. The view is beautiful though and nice for relaxing in a chair. There are nice quiet places to escape screaming children and adults who tend to hang around the day use area which is nice. We had some 20 year old thugs and their girl friends (with their baby) playing EXTREMELY loud rap music from their car. So loud you could hear the plastic inside rattling but the hosts could do nothing as the park has no rules about noise after 8am.

visited June 15^th, 16^th, 17^th, 2012. used tent only, upsides, good for boating, swimming, showers were hot & free, people were friendly, the camp ranger sells fire wood for 10.00, bathrooms were clean, went with a large group, with lots of kids, some adults with us were loud all night drinking, & were warned the next morning to be more more quite or get kicked out! no worries, that didn’t happen, the town is close by, and a small store even closer. everyone had a good time, we will be going back soon.
down side, the weather can get very hot in ukiah, on sat ⁶⁄₁₆ it was 107 degrees!!! wear water shoes, keep the drinking guests quite. take bug spray.