Reservations are Open for the Fall Campout!
October 5-11, 2026
at the Grape Festival Grounds
413 E Lockeford Street, Lodi CA
The Friendly Ghosts, a trio of smoking hot young Nor Cal pickers, will make their debut at the Lodi Grape Festival Grounds Saturday, Oct. 10 at 7:00 pm. They’ll be followed by the CBA’s annual membership get-together, where you’ll get to hear the much-anticipated results of the board election that’s going on right now (don’t forget to vote!) and quiz CBA leaders on any topic at all!
The CBA membership meeting is a great opportunity to check in on how bluegrass is doing in California. You’ll hear straight from the horse’s mouth about what the CBA is doing to pursue its mission of preserving and promoting bluegrass and old-time music all over our state and beyond.
This is all part of the CBA Fall Campout, which is like a small festival crossed with a family reunion, without any stages to distract you from the picking (except for the aforementioned Saturday night set by the Friendly Ghosts in Jackson Hall.) And we have the popular Wernick jam class, back by popular demand!
If you’re in a mood for hanging around and picking with old friends and new ones, the Fall Campout is the place for you. And the price is right! There’s no ticket to buy, just a modest camping fee of $15 a night ($20 if you pay after Oct. 4). That’s per campsite, not per person. The RV hookup fee is just $55 a night ($60 after the 12th).
NOTE FOR TENT CAMPERS:
If you’re staying in a tent, or in a vehicle that doesn’t need to hook up to water or electricity, don’t bother reserving a spot! Just pay your camping fee at the registration table and go pitch your tent somewhere that’s not obviously an RV hookup spot. (There’s lots of room.) Only RV hookup spots need to be reserved!
NOTE FOR RV CAMPERS:
The National Steamup Symposium is a gathering of model train enthusiasts whose engines run on real steam. It’ll be in process right inside the pavilion from Wednesday through Saturday of the Campout week, and pickers are welcome to go in and check out their very cool steam engines!
It takes a lot of extra gear to run real steam models, so we’ve agreed to let the steam group park their trucks and RVs on the whole square of lawn directly in front of the pavilion entrance. That’s why you don’t see sites 47-55 on the RV hookup reservation page. For this campout only, those hookup sites are reserved for the train engineers for the entire campout week, Monday through Saturday. We apologize to those who are used to parking their RVs in that area. For this campout only, please pick a spot elsewhere on the grounds, and we’ll do our best to help work out any issues that may arise.
Meanwhile, we hope you’ll join the special train song jams that Joyce Hennessey will be leading in the paved area in front of the big pavilion. Joyce has been organizing these jams at the Father’s Day festival for a couple of years now, to great acclaim. Everyone’s welcome!
Tent / Dry RV camping (no electric or water hookup)
Advance (until Sunday Oct. 4 at 5:00pm): $15
At the gate: $20 per night
RV hook-up camping
Advance (until Sunday Oct. 4 at 5:00pm) $55
At the gate: $60 per night
Note: Prices are per night per campsite, not per person. The campsite fee covers up to two adults and two kids under 18, and a tent plot up to 10×15 feet, plus parking for one car.
