Camping near garden of the gods

any blm or primitive camping relatively nearby ?

Head up Rampart Range Road, leaves from right in the middle of the park (right turn onto dirt just before balancing rock). About 3-5 miles up the road you will enter USFS land and find basically unlimited primitive car camping sites, just pull off any of the spur roads or turnouts. Was a favorite hangout of mine from 2007-2012

Have fun!

Thanks bud , perfect !

Hey I'm planning a GOTG trip next weekend and was interested in the free camping options, anyone have experience with the Rampant Range road camping?

I camped up there last time. I'd find camping in the light if I did it again. We drove up for miles looking for spots ... Finding (non dog friendly) spots with glass and other bullshit for the first 3-5 miles, after a long roust of driving and checking we eventually found a nice spot to cozy down for the night . In other words , it's not bad , but the further you drive the better it gets . The "site" we ended up staying at was before you got to the pikes peak overlook turnout . Kind of an island in between the road and a curve , but it was relatively flat and in the morning we walked up to the overlook and had great views.

Glad you found some good stuff! IME there's even better camping about 2-3 miles beyond where you stopped, as the road becomes more wooded and leaves the obvious ridgeline. Really any of the dirt tracks that leave the main road lead to spots with fire rings etc.

Just look around for shell casings and avoid those places.

So Rampart Range road is still closed I believe. As a second option, Drive up Old Stage Road until you reach national forest. There are plenty of places to camp up there.

Dan Cooksey wrote:So Rampart Range road is still closed I believe. As a second option, Drive up Old Stage Road until you reach national forest. There are plenty of places to camp up there.

That's a little weirder, as some people live here and there off Old Stage Road, which becomes Gold Camp Road eventually. But this is probably the most promising place to camp as it's so close to downtown. The key in this area is to have a vehicle that can handle some rough roads. The numbered forest roads can be quite daunting. If you camp up there, avoid shooting guns as there are houses and cabins all around as well as mountain bikers and hikers.

Old Stage/ Gold Camp has always worked for me as recently as December. As soon as you are past the residential developments any pulloff off of the road is fair game for car-camping for at least a night or two, and there are plenty of "legit" campsites off dirt roads as well. Just be prepared for traffic on weekends. General rule of thumb around CSprings is if you are camping in your car/camper for a night or two, pretty much anywhere where the road turns to dirt above the city is kosher (take that with a grain of salt, my standards for "okay" are pretty lax but I've never heard of issues)