Permit/Reservation for Climbing Rainier July 10-11

Looking for a little information...

A friend of mine and I have been looking to summit and ski down Rainier for some time now and we looking at the weekend of July 10/11. I was looking into making a reservation (should have done this sooner probably, but didn't know what weekend worked for us) and it says you probably won't get a response for 3 weeks. 3 weeks is a little too far out to know if we have a spot or not.

Anyone have any experience with the first come/first serve the night before or morning of? We're looking to camp at camp schurman.

Just looking for advice for getting a spot to sleep...send it in asap or just go first come first serve cause its too late to send it in?

Thanks in advance.

I've never had any problem getting a day-of camping permit, even on the weekend. If Schurman is full, which it won't be, you could always camp on the Emmons Flats or Camp Curtis.

We were first in line at the Ranger station on Saturday, and they told us Schurman was full. The nice ranger gave the first few parties permits anyway, so we were able to stay at Schurman. Apparently, if enough people show up on Friday and get the first come first serve for multiple nights then there aren't any left on Saturday... !

Well I suspect enough people didn't need the extra day they reserved, because Schurman had plenty of space for us on Saturday night.