I had a client send me out to photograph a project in San Mateo County. Given how the traffic works (or doesn’t work), I decided to drive down the peninsula the night before and camp so that I could be close to the photo location in the morning. I wanted to take advantage of the morning light for the photo shoot. The place I picked to camp was Memorial County Park, not far from the town of La Honda. This turned out to be a lovely spot in a lush grove of redwood trees. It was close to dusk when I parked my rig. The fog was starting to roll in off the ocean, giving a quiet, peaceful feeling. The park encompasses 675 acres with 156 camp sites. I was one of three campers in the park on a Tuesday night, May 1. I imagine in the summer this is a busy camp ground. The fee was $25 and showers were available. No dogs are allowed, and I’m usually looking for dog friendly camps. In the morning I spent a few minutes wandering around camp before heading to the La Honda Creek Open space which was the location for the photo shoot. It was a real treat finding such a lovely place to camp in the off season.
I camped at Memorial Park on Columbus Day in 2014 and it was a mad house. I did get a pretty campsite, but the place was crawling with kids. OK, I was a kid once, too, but don’t think I screamed that much.
The next night I stayed at Butano State Park and that was a very pleasant experience. The nice park attendant let me chose between a normal site (surrounded by cousins of the kids at Memorial) or I could park my pop-up camper in one of the walk-in tent sites. I chose the later and it was beautiful and peaceful.