Best places to camp, hike, and be outdoors with your dog

If a major enjoyment of your RV lifestyle is traveling with your pet, more specifically a dog, you have probably had to deal with various rules wherever you camp regarding how your canine friend is to be treated. It can range from free-to-run to keep-out.

Tom Steinstra, the outdoor columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and author of California Camping, a guide to 50,000 campgrounds in the state that includes forest service and BLM campgrounds, wrote about the best and worst places to take your dog on California public lands in a Chronicle article published Thursday.

You can tell he has a personal feeling about dogs--as most of you do who have one--when he says, "If you grew up with a dog, you learned to treat them as members of the family, partners for life, and the best buddy on the trail you could ask for, where to watch them run free and happy provides exhilarating satisfaction. If you have never had a dog, you might prefer a world without them, and want dogs kept out of parks and off trails. The rules at parks, which vary widely, often cater to that difference in thinking."

Here are his findings on the best places in California (and some specific to the San Francisco Bay Area) to camp, hike, or simply just be with your dog.

Five best for dogs

1. U.S. Forest Service: Nineteen national forests in California, 1 million acres, 800 campgrounds, 60 major wilderness areas; dogs permitted except in selected campgrounds or a few places where signed.

2. Bureau of Land Management (BLM): 15.2 million acres (includes huge portions of southern deserts), 87 wilderness areas: The primitive, dog-friendly BLM allows dogs in wilderness (King Range National Conservation Area), has dog training days at Fort Ord, and limits dogs only in areas with critical wildlife habitat and endangered species.

3. East Bay Regional Park District: 65 parks, 110,000 acres, 1,200 miles of trails; dogs permitted on most trails, including off leash away from trailheads if under voice command.

4. Marin Municipal Water District: 21,250 acres, 130 miles of trails and ranch roads; dogs permitted on leash on virtually all trails and ranch roads.

5. Marin County Parks and Open Space District: 21 parks and 34 open space preserves, including several waterfront parks with picnic areas; dogs permitted on leash, with some areas OK off leash.

But if you are among those who prefer there be no dogs where you recreate, Steinstra recommends:

Five best for no dogs

1. San Francisco watershed lands: 23,000 acres (with four lakes) at the Crystal Springs Watershed on the Peninsula, 30,000 acres (with two lakes) at Alameda/Calaveras watershed lands near Sunol. Vast swaths of wildlands have private, subsidized homes as perks for employees, yet provide an unparalleled lack of public access.

2. U.S. National Parks: 25 national parks in California, including Yosemite, Lassen, Redwood and Sequoia-Kings Canyon; dogs are best left home because they are allowed only in campsites and are forbidden from most open spaces, trails and wilderness.

3. San Mateo County Parks and Recreation: 17 parks, 15,680 acres; no dogs permitted on any trail in any park.

4. State Parks: 279 units, 1.3 million acres, 5,095 miles of trails, roughly 50 parks in Bay Area (depending where you draw the boundary); dogs allowed only in campsites and on asphalt, prohibited on trails (one exception is undeveloped McNee Ranch State Park) and state beaches.

5. Mid-peninsula Regional Open Space District: 26 preserves, 60,000 acres; dogs permitted only on designated trails at nine preserves, those not removing dog waste can be cited, though horse owners get a pass.