Mapped · not agency-listedPublic land · dispersedFree
Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM
Drive-up · public land · AZ · 36.14735, -109.33895
Inside a national park unit
Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM sits inside Canyon de Chelly National Monument — a national monument run by the National Park Service.
Park rules apply, and they are stricter than dispersed camping: inside a National Park Service unit you camp in a designated campground or on a backcountry permit, not wherever you find a flat spot. Check the park before you go: nps.gov/cach ↗
This page calls it a dispersed camp because that is what the source record says. Inside a park unit that word does not mean camp anywhere.
The land here is Navajo Nation trust land, co-managed with the National Park Service; the campground is run by the Navajo Nation, not the NPS.
Placed by point-in-polygon against the National Park Service’s own boundary layer (NPS Land Resources Division, 442 units, fetched 18 Sep 2026; this unit’s polygon edited 2010-12-14). Nothing about the price or the legal status on this page was changed by it.
Ask an AI about this campsiteOpens Grok already loaded with this site. It reads the same records this page is built from, and links whatever it tells you.
Ask about this camp →A mapped lead, not an agency listing. Somebody marked this as a campsite; we could not match it to a land-manager record. Worth checking rather than counting on. What changes is conditions — roads, gates, closures, fire rules. Check those with the unit before you commit to the drive.
What the record says about the site — Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM · public land · AZ
- Toilet on site
From the OpenStreetMap contributors listing for this site — their words, not our visit. Records go stale; treat it as a starting point and confirm anything your trip depends on.
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 7,036 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NMNIFC · AirNow
Checking active fires & air quality…
Active wildfires from NIFC (within ~50 mi); air quality from AirNow. Always confirm current fire restrictions with the managing office before you go.
Everything you need — measured from Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM · public land · AZ
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- WWater11 mi
- LLaundry12 mi
- @Mail12 mi
- FFuel12 mi
- GGrocery14 mi
- AAir-up14 mi
- HHardware14 mi
- +Urgent care32 mi
- RxPharmacy32 mi
- MMechanic47 mi
- EVEV fast charger53 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water's a short hop out, fuel & food sit about 12 mi out, the nearest EV fast charger is a 53-mi run (and back).
Not within 60 mi: Dump, Propane. Plan those before you head up.
One dot per need — the nearest of each kind, straight-line from camp. Places from OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors); the EV fast charger from the US DOE station locator. Open in Google Maps ↗
The site — Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM
Access
Drive-up
Land
public land · dispersed
Elevation
7,036 ft
Ground slope
5.6% · gentle
State
AZ
Coordinates
36.14735, -109.33895
Cost
Free · OpenStreetMap fee tag: no
Nearby & resupply — around Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM · public land · AZ (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureWater · mapped within 1.6 mi
- USGS NHDno named surface water within 1 mi
- Nearest townDel Muerto · ~6.3 mi
- Rail & highwaynone mapped within 10 mi
- Drinking waternone within 10 mi
- FuelSpeedway · ~14.1 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- GroceriesBashas' · ~13.8 mi
- Hospital / clinicHospital · ~12.4 mi
- HardwareNavajo Westerners Ace Hardware · ~13.8 mi
EV charging — from Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM · public land · AZ — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger52.8 mi straight-line SE — Gallup, NM - Tesla Supercharger (at a hotel) · Tesla · NACS (Tesla) · 8 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-06-18 · hours: 24 hours daily. Open to Teslas only. · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reachnone within 25 mi · none within 50 · 19 within 100 · 50 within 150
- Nearest listing CCS53.4 mi — Gallup, NM, Gallup
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO53.4 mi — Walmart 906 (Gallup, NM), Gallup
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)14.1 mi — FT DISTRICT STATION 2, Tsaile, AZ · ChargePoint Network · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: 24 hours daily
- Pricing at the fast chargernot listed
- Power (kW)not listed by AFDC — “DC fast” spans roughly 24 to 350 kW, so ask the network.
- Read this honestlyStraight-line miles, like every distance on this site. Roads run longer than this, and you have to get back. We know where a charger is listed. We don’t know if it works today, how fast it is, or the road miles. Check the network before you commit.
Snapshot 2026-09-16 · AFDC record 102305 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM · public land · AZ — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- RestroomAntelope Comfort Station · ~5.7 mi W · NPS
- RestroomWhite House Comfort Station · ~7.9 mi W · NPS
- RestroomHQ Picnic Area Comfort Station · ~11.2 mi W · NPS
- RestroomHQ Visitor Center Building · ~11.2 mi W · NPS
Coming out here — Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM · public land · AZ
- Surface water mapped nearby: Water. That is wash water at best, and nobody has checked it for you — a creek can be dry and a tank can be mud. Filter or boil anything you drink. USGS maps no named surface water within 1 mi of the pin (National Hydrography Dataset, data refreshed October 2022).
- Ground slope around the pin: about 5.6% — gentle. Measured on USGS's 3DEP elevation model (1 m data here), sampled every 10 metres around the point. That is the hillside, not the ground under your wheels — a graded pullout or a bench a few metres across is too small to show up at that spacing, and nobody has checked this one for you.
- No rail line and no interstate or US route is mapped within 10 mi of the pin. Checked against the FRA/BTS North American Rail Network (data updated Jul 21, 2026) and the Census's TIGER/Line primary roads (TIGER/Line 2025, released Oct 2025). Both are national files and both are maps of what is built, not counts of what moves on it.
- Assume no services at all. Most dispersed camping in a national forest has none: no tap, no power, no dump, often no toilet. Everything you need, you bring.
- Power: Dave carries his own — batteries or solar. A generator will run your rig and it is also the thing everybody camped near you can hear.
- Getting online: Dave recommends Starlink. He has had it since SpaceX introduced it, used it for four years living on the road, and it delivers as promised — several hundred nights out, and he can count on one hand the places he could not connect. The cable on his unit runs 150 feet, which is usually all it takes to find enough sky. Starlink → Referral link — Starlink pays Dave $100 in cash if you sign up through it, and that money funds this site and the next trip. It costs you nothing and does not change the recommendation.
Open Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM elsewhere
How we know this — Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM
Source
OpenStreetMap contributors
Confidence
Likely — The record is good enough to put a pin on, but thin in places. Treat the details as a starting point, not gospel.
How it was placed
no road or trail found nearby — check manually
Site details
The OpenStreetMap contributors listing's own fields for this site (site type, whether tents or trailers fit, capacity, toilet, water, campfires, reservations). Printed as the record states them, unchecked by us, and never used to make a cost claim -- the cost verdict above is decided separately and audited before every deploy.
EV chargers
US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center station locator, snapshot 2026-09-16. Straight-line miles to the nearest public, open, unrestricted station; restricted and planned units are shown but never counted.
Field check
Contributed, not agency-listed. A mapper marked this as a campsite. We have not matched it to a land-manager record, so it stays at Likely.
What we don’t know about Free Campground in Canyon de Chelly NM
A land record can put you within a few meters of a spot. It cannot tell you any of this — so check it yourself, and treat anything below as the open question it is.
- Road surface & last-mile access
- How many rigs actually fit
- Cell coverage by carrier
- Seasonal & winter access
- Current fire restrictions
- Whether any water here is drinkable
- Shade & wind exposure
- Noise and who else shows up
- Whether a listed EV charger works today, or the road miles to it