Cat Lake

Fantastic spot… had a bear visitor though so make sure you use the caches for your food… he was pretty big too! Go down to the lake at night and shine a flashlight and watch the lake come alive!

Love, love, love Cat Lake!
It’s $ 15/​site each night. If there isn’t a fire ban then you can buy wood from the Rangers by the arm-​load ($ 8) or wheelbarrow ($ 25).
There’s a 2 km logging road off of the highway to get to the parking lot. The road is kind of rough, so it’s a good idea to take it slow. The road is best suited to trucks/​Jeeps/​SUV type vehicles but can be driven up in a car if you take it easy.
The parking lot often fills up fast, but there is an overflow lot as well as parking along the road.
You can’t drive in to the sites, so be prepared to carry in your gear. There are sites 5min from the parking lot, but they get claimed quickly and you could find yourself walking most of the way around the lake. The camp provides a few wheelbarrows to help with packing in/​out, but you can’t count on getting one if it’s busy.
If you camp at Cat Lake you need to be Bear-​Aware. There are bears in the area, and they have had serious problems with campers and bears in the past. All food items, cooking supplies, toiletries, clothes worn while cooking should be kept either in your car or in one of the many bear caches provided. Garbage and recycling should be disposed of in their respective bins and not stored in the caches. It takes a little bit of extra time to keep your site bear safe; however, when a bear’s life (and your safety) depend on it, then it’s not a big thing to take time out of your routine to do.
The lake is fantastic for swimming May-​September. There are a few docks and a rope swing.
Cat Lake has a reputation for being a party site. Rangers are trying to change that, and in the 10+ years I’ve been going there I’ve noticed that it has gradually become much more family oriented. I’m not sure if that’s due to the effort of the Rangers, the fact that the partiers of the past are coming with their young families now, or some combination of the two.
Bring toilet paper! The outhouses are almost always out of toilet paper.
Most campers at Cat Lake are friendly and the overall feel is very fun and relaxed.

Great campsite but there are a few things to know before you get there:
— they have been clamping down on the partying here. Apparently Cat Lake has a reputation for partying, but it no longer applies. Boy the Rangers were serious, giving us the ground rules from the get go, and even visiting on Saturday night to provide reminders.
— it should be a requirement that you have a truck /​suv /​jeep to drive to the campsite. It is a real rocky ride to get there, and your station wagon /​civic might not survive the trip. The car beside us ended up with a flat tire.
— It might be a big of a trek to get to your camp site (about 10 – 15 minutes) and while there are a few wheelbarrows available, it might be hard to get one if you come at a busy time (and the closer sites are taken), so you’ll have to carry all your coolers and supplies with you for a not insignificant walk if you plan on comfort camping.
Otherwise plenty of space on the campsite with table benches and a fire pit at each one, beautiful lake nearby that isn’t too too cold, not that many bugs, and outhouses that aren’t that horrible if you really have to go there. Give it a try!

Showed up Saturday with no camp spot but met some cool new friends on the lake and were welcomed into their campground. Park Ranger gave us some hassle about it but we paid our $ 13 per car and he let it slide. The place was pretty packed, despite serious bear warnings and half the campground being closed due to a roaming and pissed off mama bear.
We were super meticulous about food prep, putting everything back into the cars (a 10min walk away) when done. Since a baby bear had tore up a tent a few days earlier (in our exact spot!), and was sadly shot because of it, warnings were strict about what to keep in the campground, though not everyone around was taking the directions seriously enough.
We put away our cooking stove, gas canisters, soap, lip gloss, sunscreen, even the clothes were wore to cook — as advised. Once we had this back under control we could kick back and enjoy this great site.
A couple graveley beaches fill up fast with sun seekers while others float by on blow-​up toys and meandering logs. Great relaxing weekend overall. Have to say we were the loudest group, even though music was off at 10PM. Seemed everyone may’ve been tired from too much sun and turned in early.