Camping near Moab

Looking for a place to camp near Moab. All the free spots are secret, where are some good places to camp for extremely cheap or free?

Think BLM.

(Not obvious BLM).

Hardly secret. Maybe the best ones.

If you search this site for camping Moab I bet you come up with a lot. I know I've posted in the past about it.

Go into the lasals.

googlemaps the area that you're looking at. Areas shaded in green are public lands. Find a place in green, jot down some directions (and maybe some alternates just in case).

Find out what type of land it is- National Forest or BLM, then search our government websites for the regulations for those lands.

As always, pack out your trash and someone elses, don't build a huge fire in the middle of the desert, and don't destroy the vegetation.

If you need a more accurate map of the area, find a gear store that has/can print a USGS map of the specific area.

If you wanted to pay a little, there are beautiful sites along the Colorado river east of Moab on HWY128.

While Google maps is useful for this, my experience lately has been that the district rangers are "managing" the BLM lands around Moab much more actively than they used to. If you're heading out to one of those green areas on the map, you might not want to wait until the end of the day to scope it out.

Go to the Gearheads shop in dt Moab. Cool place, and nice folks who knowledgeable about the good campsites, plus they have useful maps. Like somebody else said, the BLM sites along Hwy 128 (river road) are a definite option. I camped there my first night in Moab, and it was awesome to fall asleep/wake up to the sound of the river. I have also heard good things about the Kane Creek sites, but haven't tried em out yet.

Onion Creek, about 45 minutes east of Moab and just before the Fisher Towers turnoff.

Thanks for all of the suggestions! Moonflower canyon is great site along kane creek road that is not free. I ended up camping at the trailhead for castleton. It's a great site, It has no facilities but is very nice and close enough to moab for our purposes. onion creek sounds like a good one, I'll have to try that one out.

Keep in mind that many of the sites, such as Onion Creek, now require a portable toilet system.

Bill Duncan wrote:Keep in mind that many of the sites, such as Onion Creek, now require a portable toilet system.