Quote:
Originally Posted by sharon
how do i go about getting a listing of state parks, national forests,B.L.M. lands ------any such places that are fairly cheap and hopefully not as packed as the typical campgrounds?
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First,
don't waste your money or time looking in either the Woodahls or Good Sam "Campground" directories. These publications are both completely focused on the commercial "campgrounds", aka RV Parking Lots. Although they have listings for public campgrounds, all that's usually there is a phone number for whatever government agency is responsible for the particular campground. Call that number and you'll likely spend a lot of time wending through a bureaucratic maze getting to some person who actually has first hand knowledge of the campground of interest.
For state parks, just Google for [name of state] "state parks"....e.g. "Colorado State Parks". You'll invariably turn up the State run website (which are generally quite good) for that State. If you find a particular park of interest, then check it on Gorp.com or one of the other true outdoors websites. You
might also check one of RV camping review websites like
RV Park Reviews...sometimes there is a review of a non-commercial campground.
For National Forest campgrounds (at least those in the Western States), the best source I've ever found is
The National Forest Campground Guide. Nearly all the comments about every campground were written by the authors after they did a personal visit/campout at the the campground.
When you're ready to pick a
specific campsite at the many public campgrounds that take campsite reservations, be sure to visit either
Reserve America or
Reserve USA. I've found that Reserve USA is easier to use for campground/campsite searches but that I need to go to Reserve America for campsite reservations in most state parks.