Indian Grinding Rock State Historic Park (Chaw'se)
Pine Grove (Amador County) · near Pine Grove · Gold Country & Central Valley
Camping
At a glance
- Difficulty
- beginner
- Elevation
- 2400
- Campsites
- ~22 sites
- Season
- Year-round (occasional light winter snow)
- Fee
- $30 standard / $35 holiday (+$8 extra vehicle)
Permits and booking
- Reservation required
- Yes
- How to reserve
- ReserveCalifornia. Small campground - summer weekends fill, but midweek is easy. A reconstructed Miwok village and the Chaw'se Regional Indian Museum are on-site.
What is here
- Setting
- forest
- Amenities
- Restrooms & outdoor showers · Drinking water · Chaw'se Regional Indian Museum · Reconstructed Miwok village & roundhouse
- Best for
- Camp beside North America's largest bedrock-mortar site and a living Miwok village
- Features
- 1,185 grinding-rock mortars - most in North America · Working ceremonial roundhouse · Reconstructed Miwok bark houses · Late-September Big Time gathering
Worth knowing
- Dogs
- Allowed
- Good for a first timer
- Yes
Camping detail
- Camp type
- developed · rv
- Intl tip
- Start at the Chaw'se museum before wandering the grinding rock and village - it transforms what you're looking at. The 22-site campground fills on summer weekends but is easy midweek; time a trip to the late-September Big Time gathering if you can.
The guide
Indian Grinding Rock is a cultural destination as much as a campground - a small, oak-and-pine state park in the Amador foothil…
In the Guidebook
Everything above is yours for free. The written guide to Indian Grinding Rock State Historic Park (Chaw'se) — what it is actually like, and what we would tell a friend before they went — comes with the Guidebook.
Getting there
- Coordinates
- 38.424, -120.638