Campground Crunch for Long Weekend

With good weather in sight, campgrounds around Ventura County are either booked or filling up fast for the long Memorial Day weekend.

At Los Padres National Forest near Ojai, campgrounds probably will be full before Friday, predicted Don Turner, a law enforcement officer for the National Forest Service.

“People are kidding themselves if they think they are going to come up on Saturday and get a site,” Turner said.

He said there are 146 sites at seven campgrounds off California 33--available on a first-come, first-served basis--and every year carloads of would-be campers arrive on Saturday and are disappointed.

“They don’t realize the demand,” he said.

It is a similar story at Lake Piru, near Fillmore. Of 238 campsites, only 50 were left by Wednesday.

The lake doesn’t take reservations, and some campers come early and pay for extra days they may not even use to hold the sites for the weekend.

Every campsite at McGrath State Beach, Faria Beach, Rincon Parkway, Leo Carrillo State Beach and Point Mugu State Park has been reserved for weeks.

The crowd of people expected over the weekend was bad news for Mike Phillips and Susan Talkington, who are new to the area and have been staying at McGrath State Beach.

“We’ll have to leave Friday,” Phillips said.

“You can’t get a campsite anywhere in Ventura County.”

At Lake Casitas, where a new reservation system is in place, rangers reported 30 campsites remaining out of 450 for the three-day weekend.

But another 200 sites are available in a grassy “overflow” area that does not have picnic tables or fire pits.

“The rain made everything nice and green and fresh for the weekend,” said Casitas ranger Bill Wadlington.

“We’re getting a lot of calls.”

More rain may arrive next week, but probably not before Tuesday, according to meteorologist Terry Schaeffer of the National Weather Service.

Fair weather, with morning and evening low clouds, is expected to last through the weekend, he said.

“It’ll be typical spring-type stuff,”

Schaeffer said.

Temperatures, expected to be in the 70s, may be slightly cooler than normal.