Primitive site · Green Ridge State Forest, Maryland

Campsite 2

777 ft east-facing hollow

Site 2 is one of the primitive, first-come campsites scattered through Green Ridge State Forest in western Maryland. It sits at 777 ft on an east-facing hollow, with Fifteenmile Creek 310 ft east. The drive in is rated “Gravel road”.

Open site 2 in the app See every site on the map

Lay of the land

The ground it sits on

The elevation model puts the pitch at 777 ft, on a hollow tilted about 3.2° to the east.

Within the 1.2 km square sampled around it, the site stands 32 ft above the lowest ground in that square, which lies 0.4 mi south and 279 ft below the high ground 0.4 mi northeast.

The nearest mapped water is Fifteenmile Creek, 310 ft east.

20 ft contours, 1.2 km across, from the USGS 3DEP elevation model. Watercourses from OpenStreetMap. The dot is the site.

Sun and shade

What the ridges do to its light

The tallest ground on this site's horizon stands 13.7° above level, to the west.

On the March equinox direct sun reaches the pitch at 8:02 am and leaves it at 6:12 pm: 10 h 12 m of it, against 12 h 12 m of daylight on an open horizon.

That gap — 2 h — is what the ridges take, and it is rarely taken evenly off both ends of the day.

Across the year the pitch runs from 13 h 14 m of direct sun at the June solstice down to 7 h 14 m at the December solstice.

Direct sun on the pitch, 2026. “Open horizon” is what the same day would give with no ridges in the way.
Date	First light	Last light	Direct sun	Open horizon
20 March	8:02 am	6:12 pm	10 h 12 m	12 h 12 m
21 June	6:52 am	8:04 pm	13 h 14 m	15 h 2 m
21 December	8:14 am	3:26 pm	7 h 14 m	9 h 26 m

Getting there

Gravel road

Forest gravel. Fine in a car, taken slowly.

You arrive on Fifteen Mile Creek Road Southeast, which OpenStreetMap classes as a minor public road.

1.2 mi of unpaved driving stands between the last pavement and the site.

The steepest stretch of that final approach measures 7.7% on the elevation model, climbing 91 ft in total.

The pitch opens directly off the road — no carry.

Measured

Unpaved approach: 1.2 mi
Steepest grade: 7.7%
Total climb: 91 ft
Road to pitch: here

Where these numbers come from

Provenance

Everything on this page is derived from open data at build time. None of it is anyone's opinion, and none of it was measured on foot.

Elevation, landform, slope, aspect, contours, the horizon profile and the steepest grade on the approach come from the USGS 3D Elevation Program (3DEP), read from terrain-RGB tiles at zoom 14.
Roads and watercourses come from OpenStreetMap contributors, licensed ODbL.
Sun times are computed from the NOAA Solar Calculator equations against that measured skyline — when the sun clears the ridge, not when an almanac says it rises. Figures are for 2026; they shift by a minute or two from year to year.
Campsite coordinates come from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources campsite GIS layer.
Character tags and field notes come from campers, and are the only thing here that is a judgement rather than a measurement.
Availability comes from nowhere, because there is no source for it. See above.

Greenridge is an independent community project. It is not affiliated with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources or any government agency, and the forest's own rules always win.