How to get campsite cancelation alerts for Reserve California

Campers worldwide dream of beautiful California, hoping to stay in its iconic parks. National parks like Yosemite, Joshua Tree, and Lake Tahoe are excellent and bookable on recreation.gov. What about those amazing state parks, though? I’ll cover those in today’s article—and tell you how you can snap up campsites even in sold-out parks!

What are the most popular state parks in California?

State beaches are a big deal in California. These spaces get you about as close as you’ll get to summer paradise! From our records, the top 5 most popular state parks in California are:

1. San Elijo State Beach
2. South Carlsbad State Beach
3. Doheny State Beach
4. Carpinteria State Beach
5. Pfeiffer Big Sur State Beach

Although the listed parks are popular, many other notable state parks exist in California. Crystal Cove State Park and its beach cottages are in high demand. Similarly, New Brighton State Beach, San Clemente State Beach, and Refugio State Beach are famous among California campers.

How do campsite alerts work for California State Parks?

You can book California’s state parks on Reserve California. Sites are made available six months in advance of the current date. For example, on January 4, you can reserve campsites for July 4. Some of these campsites will be already be booked if they’re part of a multi-day reservation that extends into otherwise unbookable dates. Additionally, these sites will get booked fast (minutes or seconds), given the demand.

No luck on on launch day? You still have hope. Between today and your camping trip, many campers’ plans will change. When they do, they’ll cancel their reservations. They’ll do this for a few reasons, including: Being a good camper, Getting a partial refund, Maintaining their good standing with California State Parks.

You can book that new opening if you’re on Reserve California when a campsite gets canceled. The challenging part is that this requires a lot of checking. A campsite availability checker can do the legwork for you and send you an alert when a campsite or permit opening matches your needs.

Here’s a video that shows you how Campnab works:

Are campsites released and scanned in real time?

Campnab doesn’t track Reserve California’s cancelation activity every second. Doing so would be difficult and put undue pressure on their booking system. Instead, it periodically checks Reserve California for changes in campsite status. It then uses that information to determine which campsites match your requirements.

These scans run around the clock at standard intervals ranging from every 1 to 15 minutes. The scan tier you choose and the scan rate we assign impact this interval. California releases some campsites right when they become available. We send members alerts for these openings, and they start with the word “Hurry” or “Yay”. If you get one, act fast as others are also looking—and these openings will get rebooked quickly.

What is site locking on Reserve California?

California is one of a few areas that implement a site-locking approach on some canceled reservations. This approach results in the booking system holding some newly available sites for future release. You can spot these locked sites in the booking system by the lock icon next to the available campsite:

You might be wondering which sites will be released immediately and which ones will be locked. Your guess is as good as ours. To us, this seems mostly random; however, there seems to be more site locking at more popular parks during high-demand times.

Reserve California typically releases locked sites at 8:00 Pacific Time the following morning. That said, we often spot variations in the actual release time. So, if you receive an unlock alert, you’ll want to keep an eye on that opening a bit before (and possibly after) the time it is set to release. Our article on unlock alerts offers more insight into these availabilities.

Do you have any tips for picking up canceled reservations in California?

We have lots of tips on finding canceled campsites in California. Here’s the short version:

• Use all of your available scan slots
• Select more campgrounds
• Select all campsites (not just specific ones)
• Apply filters sparingly
• Expand your arrival date range
• Set a short minimum stay
• Start your scan early (but expect more alerts as your arrival date nears)
• Create new scans when your current ones expire

The above tips are primarily for finding campsite cancelations. I also wrote an article on how to get a campsite when all the parks are booked. This one will be helpful to you in your general campsite planning, not just for finding canceled reservations.

Which Campnab tier should I choose to scan California State Parks?

If you’re only looking to camp at state parks in California, you can often use our lowest-priced tier to get alerts. This plan tier is $10/month; you can cancel it anytime. Given how in-demand California State Parks are, it might seem strange that I’m encouraging you to try a lower-frequency scan tier. That said, given that California locks many canceled campsites for future release, the lowest-priced tier is often good enough.

If you’re seeing a lot of real-time cancelations for campsites, it might be worth upgrading to one of the higher-frequency scan tiers. These will undoubtedly help with canceled reservations that are released immediately. Generally, though, I recommend starting with a lower-priced tier and only upgrading if you feel it’ll give you an advantage. For more plan information, visit our Pricing page.

Alternatively, you can check out this video, in which I talk about the different ways (pay-per-use, monthly plans, annual plans) you can use Campnab:

What do I do if I don’t get any alerts for canceled campsites?

Sometimes, scans don’t work out. It could be that your scan is overly specific, there might not be enough lead time, the park might be temporarily closed, or no one has canceled their reservations. If you’re unsure of your scan or the results you’re experiencing, let us know.

My name’s Eric, and I’m one of the two people working on Campnab. I have helped thousands of campers optimize their scans, troubleshoot glitches, and find “hidden” sites. I’m happy to do the same for you! Just click on the chat button on the right side of this screen, send me an email, or call me at 604-683-2250, and we’ll get things sorted out. 🙂

Do you have any other recommendations for planning my California camping trip?

In the past months, I’ve written some articles to help you plan your California camping trip. Here are some links to these handy articles:

• How to book a campsite on Reserve California
• How to find places to camp in California
• The Best Camping in California

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