San Onofre Recreation Beach

Wonderful place to spend some time at the beach. Full hook-ups are $76 a night, W/E $71. Office staff great and accommodating to a couple of changes I needed to make with our reservations, as my mom was on hospice care at this time and the reason we stayed so long. Great views of the beach to watch the surfers, dolphins and brown pelicans! Just remember there are little critter's running around at night, so if you leave a bag of trash outside, you will be welcomed to a mess you will have to clean up in the morning. Also, besides the little ground squirrels and rabbits, there is a family of skunks that live nearby. Witnessed a new neighbor hooking up his 5th wheel, when his German shepherd spotted a running skunk. The dog lost the battle and came back with skunk snot all over him! What an enjoyable smell while sitting around the campfire :) Will come by again here and also the campground at Pt. Mugu in Ventura County.

Five Stars for location One Star for Cleanliness. I would give five stars for Hospitality and Super Staff but it was not separate. Amenities: Bathrooms are the pits, dirty. Washer and dryer rooms are also dirty. A guy comes, but he does not clean...civil service at it's worst. There are no other amenities, other than going in water, or walking, at the campground, Value: Four Stars Experience: Four Stars ********************************************************* Very nice staff in the office. Especially Missy, she was very helpful. Maintenance staff is way understaffed as evidenced by the the "deferred maintenance". Broken Electrical Pillars, most of night street lighting is out on the upper side. Maintenance workers at the campground do what they can and are unfailingly pleasant. **This is a good size campground, with seasonal maintenance needed due to storms. ***I have even seen the Manager out there doing maintenance, they are that short. Bathroom and Shower Rooms: Dirty, but hot water is unlimited. The are redoing the bathrooms, bathroom on Bluff / Upper Side first, then lower side. ***That will take awhile...Camp Pendleton facility crew works from 0830 to noon, lunches, then cuts off work at 1pm. They leave a truck there with a guy sitting inside, but no Camp Pendleton Facilities personal is working after 1PM. I want that job! 8:30 to Noon, Lunch, then work stops at 1PM. Really. On Fridays they stop at noon, have a barbecue, and then get in trucks in drive back to base facilities office. Dogs, supposed to be on leash, but folks do not and that is problem. One dog on dog attack while we were there. Dogs off leash on the Beach - no staff to enforce the "no dogs on beach". $2.00 charge for each dog you bring, each night you are there. The good, the beach, nice staff.

So grateful to have gotten in here, would go back for sure. Realize my ratings seem odd...hospitality was fine, cleanliness of restroom/showers/laundry not so much. The biggest overall negative is SO MUCH deferred maintenance, it's everywhere you look. However, they had us on "the bluff" which are the best sites in our opinion even though they're not full hook-up. LOVED watching the ocean and the sunsets! We had to move back one row for our final night but no complaints because at least they had space for us and was time to dump our tanks anyway. During our stay, we enjoyed watching the surfers and also saw dolphins and pelicans in the water. And did I mention the sunsets? Campground is great for walking on the beach and services are an easy drive away. By the way, no one enforces, "no dogs on beach."

Stayed here starting on the tail end of the Labor Day holiday weekend. No full hook up (FHU) spaces available on the holiday night (Monday the 7th) so we stayed in the "dry camp" section (no water, power or sewer). Since we do not have an on-board generator we "roughed" it. But it was very quiet. We were the only RV in the Dry Camp section. The next 4 nights were in the FHU section up above the beach. Level spot, easy hookups (no cable TV). The entire RV park, and the surround CA State Beaches, are surfer destinations. They pour into the area at 5 am and hit the waves. But the military FamCamp is very quiet at night, no parties or loud groups. Lots of families but very quiet after 10 pm. Each space has a big concrete fire pit and it was nice to sit out in the evening and watch the sunset over a wood fire. Easy walk down to the beach. The base Commissary and Exchange are a 5 minute drive from the Park, with a gas station (Diesel was 30 cents cheaper than the neighboring Orange County). There is also a Sonic Drive-In there for food and ice cream. The Park shower/restroom building needs some work, but the shower water was hot and no timers. Odd, but the pull-through spaces are not FHU, they only have water and power (no sewer). And the back in spaces on the bluff overlooking the ocean are also only water and power, but they have the best view. The FHU spaces are all back in (some are down directly on the beach, we stayed in Space #100, in another section up above the bluff). Office staff is nice and very accommodating. Some public areas closed due to the Covid-19. The California and Amtrak trains run North/South right next to the Park (and adjacent to the Interstate 5). But since there are no stops or crossings nearby they do not blow the train horn. You just hear a quick "swoosh" as the train goes by. You can get on the commuter train in Orange County or Oceanside and travel to downtown San Diego for a reasonable ticket price. In summary, it's a nice park if you like being on the beach, and at $45 it was MUCH cheaper than the private RV parks in Oceanside and Orange County that were charging $125+ per night.

The men's and women's bathrooms were filthy when we checked in on Sun. 9/27. There was no toilet paper in any of the stalls, the trash was over flowing, and feces were on the floors. The RV sites, surrounding roads, bathrooms, and laundry facility are in serious need of repair and maintenance. Our power box was surrounded by several large holes and the front cover had been torn off of its hinges. The office staff were very pleasant and helpful and the views and location of this facility are amazing. We paid $35 per night for water and electric but no sewer hook up. This is top dollar for a military facility. The RV park is frequently sold out on weekends creating a substantial cash flow for the MWR fund. Why isn't this money being used to maintain this crumbling facility? Please hire a Camp Host to help supervise the RV park and address after hours issues regarding excessive noise, loose dogs, leaking faucets, etc.

This is difficult because, like all good things, my favorite place is being loved to death. The environmental degradation is obvious. The sand and beach sites are permeated with fragments of plastic fringes from toys, pieces of candy wrappers, juice pack straws. Instead of using the beach, I saw parents digging away huge chunks of the berm to make play areas. Apparently it is a trend, erosion be darned. The lack of environmental concern is concerning. We watched kids tear down the shrubbery from the adjacent state park to bring back into the base to make campfires. Management are into groups because they are profitable, and they are many. The parking and traffic resembles any popular Southern California beach on weekend evenings. On the weekends and holidays, some regular sites had 20 occupants. This, of course, has had an impact on the facilities. Nevertheless, the location is spectacular and the beach can be empty during the week. Beach sites are discounted $8/night from November through March. Hospitality shines, cleanliness is taxed by the crowds. The beach sites are scheduled (once again) to be closed for renovation in January. Word is that the remaining vegetation will be taken out to squeeze in more spaces, which can't be good.

This is our favorite West Coast campground. Super convenient, adjacent to everything, on an iconic Southern California surfing beach. It can get hectic during holidays but during the off-season it is Valhalla. This is especially true for the beach sites. We stayed the limit twice with no discount whatsoever, $35/night despite relentless attempts at bartering, last winter and spring on two stays culminating with the New Years or Easter holiday. Beach sites do not offer sewer (duh - beach) but offer weekly drainage service for $10. Sites across the street from the beach with full hookups are like living on a main street with a beautiful view. Traffic is surprisingly plentiful but unnoticeable from beachfront sites. The bluff sites are close, very close, you will get to know your neighbor, but the views are spectacular and the traffic unnoticeable. Any other site is like camping on I-5, seriously, literally on I-5, with a high speed rail line for a buffer. The staff is nice and accommodating, but it is difficult to understand the placement system since one cannot reserve a particular site. We came back once from a day out to find a neighbor right next to us on an otherwise empty beach. We were also scheduled to move a couple of times, but they worked it out and we did not have to move. We did, however, ask to be moved to the north end of the beach during the King Tide, and they could not have been more accommodating. Considering the mega-campgrounds in San Diego where campers cannot fully extend their awnings without intruding in their neighbors' space for $70/night, and the CA state campgrounds that charge $60 for "premium" beach sites, San Onofre is a bargain. It has indoor and outdoor showers, two laundry rooms, a workout area, a commissary and exchange, gas station, and a library hidden in plain sight off the freeway near San Clemente, and it has the beach. The beach is alive with dolphins, avians, seals, whales, amphibians - the Marines landed one morning, views of Santa Catalina on clear days, and the entertaining antics of surfers, many of whom we got to know as they walked between beaches. The Marine gate guards are polite, respectful, and make entry uncomplicated. It really is a fabulous place.

Fabulous place! When we called the reservation system they had a special price deal going on and we paid only $20 a night. The RV sites are literally on the beach (I'm not kidding) and also directly across a small street from the beach. You can toss a rock into the surf from most of the sites. We loved this place.

I love the place, the location is awesome, well maintained. The downside is there terrible phone systems & reservations system. When you finally get a hold of someone they totally ignore the comments about their phone system and take care of you, it's the dozens of phone calls though looping phone recordings. This has been going on for over a year. Their website & facebook page don't have a email address as an alternative way to contact them. So fustrated, I am looking for other locations that care more about the customers.

R.D. left this review using the Directory software: - Great view. Price is way too high for a military base. Numerous pot holes. Some RV space are narrow. Great view.