EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK · CAMPING · FLORIDA
Two campgrounds in Everglades National Park can be reached by car, Flamingo and Long Pine Key, and both sit inside the Homestead entrance. Everything else is reached by water: ground sites on solid land, beach sites along the coast, and wooden platforms on pilings called chickees, paddled or motored to.
The campground booking and the wilderness permit are two different transactions on two different calendars. Winter reservations for Flamingo open after 20 November. Wilderness sites open 90 days before the night you want them. Both run through Recreation.gov, with a phone line for anyone who prefers to book by voice.
CAMPING AT A GLANCE · EVERGLADES
Book Flamingo on Recreation.gov once winter sites open after 20 November, and count 90 days back from your first night if the trip involves a chickee.
TWO DRIVE-IN CAMPGROUNDS · WILDERNESS: 90 DAYS AHEAD · $21 PLUS $2 PER PERSON, PER NIGHT
Go for: a dry-season site at Flamingo, with solar-heated showers, grills and an amphitheater at the end of the park road.
Think twice before: planning Long Pine Key for a family trip: reservations there are group camping only, 15 people minimum.
Facts: National Park Service · NOAA · full sources at the end
On this page
- Everglades camping reservationFlamingo & Long Pine Key
- Everglades wilderness permit90 days ahead on Recreation.gov
- Chickee campingPlatforms, beaches, ground sites
- Everglades camping fees$21 plus $2 per person
- Best season to camp in the EvergladesHeat, mosquitoes, June 1 to November 30
- Driving to Flamingo CampgroundThe Homestead entrance
The backcountry sites spread south and west of Flamingo, across Florida Bay and the mangrove coast, and every one of them is reached by water. Month-by-month weather and crowd patterns are in our Everglades calendar, and the park guide maps the three entrances.
Everglades camping reservations: Flamingo and Long Pine Key
| Site | Reservation | The condition |
|---|---|---|
| Flamingo | Recreation.gov or 1-877-444-6777 | Winter-season sites open after 20 November |
| Long Pine Key | Recreation.gov or by phone | Group camping only, 15 people minimum |
| Wilderness sites | Recreation.gov, 90 days ahead | One named site for every night of the route |
Flamingo books through Recreation.gov, and the same reservation can be made by telephone on 1-877-444-6777, or on 518-885-3639 from outside the United States. Winter-season sites there open for booking after 20 November, online or by phone. A Christmas week or a February stretch is therefore decided in the second half of November, which is when the calendar for those nights first appears.
Long Pine Key is the one that changes plans. Reservations there are for group camping only, minimum 15 people, and they also open after 20 November. A couple, a family of four or two friends sharing a canoe cannot reserve a site there. For a party under fifteen heading to the Homestead side, Flamingo is the drive-in campground.
The park publishes two booking numbers. Its permits and reservations page gives 1-877-444-6777 for Flamingo and Long Pine Key. Its camping-fees page gives 1-855-708-2207 for group camping. Both were live on the park’s own site on 6 September 2026. If one line leads nowhere, dial the other before concluding that the campground is full.
Flamingo Campground has solar-heated showers, two dump stations, picnic tables and grills, and an amphitheater used for ranger programs in season. The showers take their heat from the day, so an overcast afternoon shows up in the evening rinse. Those two dump stations are the practical detail for anyone arriving in an RV.
Everglades wilderness permits: booking 90 days ahead on Recreation.gov
Wilderness campsites open for reservation 90 days in advance, on Recreation.gov. Count back from the first night out, then set a reminder for the morning that window opens. A paddling route needs a site for every night of the trip, so the booking is a sequence: one named site on the water for each night, in order.
The confirmation e-mail is the permit. Print it, or keep a copy on the phone, and carry it for the whole trip. Nothing has to be collected at a counter, and no detour to a ranger station stands between the reservation and the launch. Rangers at the Flamingo Visitor Center can help in person if a booking needs fixing.
Since January 2023, no wilderness site is held back for walk-ups. Everything sits on Recreation.gov, including sites still open on the morning of the trip. A ranger can still help a camper book one of those free sites the same day. That help is real, and it is not the same thing as a block of sites kept aside for people who show up.
Chickee camping in the Everglades: platforms, beaches and ground sites
Backcountry sites come in three kinds. Ground sites are on solid land. Beach sites are on sand along the coast. Chickees are elevated wooden platforms standing in open water, reached mainly by canoe, kayak or motorboat. The kind of site decides the gear more than the mileage does, so read the site type before booking a route that mixes all three.
A platform night changes the packing list. Nothing holds a stake on a wooden deck, so the tent has to be freestanding and it has to stand up in wind on its own. Everything lifted out of the boat gets lowered back into it at the end, trash included. Stow the load against the rail before the light goes.
Everglades camping fees: $21 plus $2 per person, per night
Wilderness camping costs a $21 administrative fee plus $2 per person, per night. Two paddlers out for three nights pay $21 plus $12, so $33 for the trip. The $21 is charged once, and only the $2 line grows with the length of the route and the size of the party.
The camping-fee blocks on the park’s own fees page did not render when that page was read on 6 September 2026, so no nightly rate for Flamingo or Long Pine Key is quoted here. The figure appears on the Recreation.gov booking screen, before payment, which is where most campers will read it anyway.
Everglades camping season: mosquitoes, heat and the June 1 to November 30 window
From June onward the heat and the humidity run the daylight hours, and the mosquitoes take the evening. A screen room over the picnic table is standard summer equipment at Flamingo, along with more water than the drive seems to justify. Month-by-month conditions sit in our Everglades calendar.
The Atlantic hurricane season runs June 1 to November 30. A system that never comes near Homestead can still put enough wind on Florida Bay to turn a short crossing into a long one (est.). Refundable travel arrangements and a spare day in the plan are what make that stretch of the calendar workable.
The 90-day rule turns into arithmetic quickly. A booking placed on 1 March reaches nights up to 30 May, two days before the hurricane season opens. Move that same booking to 15 March and it reaches mid-June, inside the window. Early March stays clear. From roughly the middle of the month, the season starts to sit in the dates you are buying.
Getting to Flamingo Campground: which Everglades entrance and the one-hour drive
Both campgrounds are behind the Homestead entrance southwest of Miami, and Flamingo sits at the end of the park road on Florida Bay. The park’s three entrances and the Flamingo Visitor Center are each at least an hour’s drive from one another, so a base at Shark Valley or Everglades City means a separate day, not a short hop to the campsite. The three doors are mapped in the park guide.
The last word
Load water, fuel, ice and repellent in Homestead or Florida City before you pass the gate. There is nothing to buy once the road turns south, and a drive back for something forgotten costs the rest of the afternoon. Buy the bag of ice last, at the final stop, and it will still be ice at the campground.
Pitch the tent while there is still light, and have the screen room up before you need it. Then walk down to the marina to see what the tide has left along the shoreline, and check the amphitheater board for the evening ranger program. For a wilderness night, the printed confirmation goes in the dry bag, since it is the permit.
Sources & data for this guide
- NPS · Everglades camping (two drive-in campgrounds, three site types, 90-day wilderness window) · checked Sep 14, 2026
- NPS · permits and reservations (Recreation.gov, 1-877-444-6777, 518-885-3639, winter bookings after 20 November, Long Pine Key group minimum of 15) · checked Sep 14, 2026
- NPS · camping fees ($21 plus $2 per person, per night; group number 1-855-708-2207). The fee blocks for the drive-in campgrounds did not load on this page on the day it was read · checked Sep 14, 2026
- NPS · wilderness reservations FAQ (confirmation e-mail serves as the permit; walk-up sites no longer held back since January 2023) · checked Sep 14, 2026
- NPS · directions (entrances and Flamingo Visitor Center at least an hour apart) · checked Sep 14, 2026
- NOAA National Hurricane Center (season dates, June 1 to November 30) · checked Sep 14, 2026
- Items marked (est.) are field judgment, not park data. Rates and phone lines change: confirm on the booking screen before you drive.