★ Field-verified · Dave's ownUSFSFreeRoad season: open (MVUM)
Harding County
Drive-up · U.S. Forest Service · Harding County, NM · 36.04788, -104.37602
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 →Dave's been here. A spot from Dave's own travels on U.S. Forest Service land — free to camp. Conditions still change, so confirm access, stay limits and fire rules before you go.
WOW! This is a free National Forest campground in a beautiful canyon flanked by walls of sandstone. A lazy river flows through it. Enough room for one or two vehicles per site. Tent pads. Fire rings. Picnic tables. No cell service. Four-wheel drive recommended for access. Road down into canyon may be treacherous in winter. There are some lovely primitive dispersed sites nearby. Clean. Unspoiled. Might be popular in peak season. Highly recommended, but this is one of my all-time favorites. Please respect this place.
A night on record
Dave slept here on 27 January 2020. No agency publishes a season for this site itself (the road season below is the road's), so that night is the only season evidence we have — what the site was then, not a forecast for this year.
Nearest road on the Forest Service MVUM — Harding County · Cibola National Forest · NM
The nearest road on the Forest Service MVUM is FR K601 (Mills Canyon Lower C.G.), 30 ft from the pin. The MVUM lists it as crushed aggregate or gravel surface and maintenance level 3 – suitable for passenger cars.
Road season: open (MVUM) The MVUM lists FR K601 (Mills Canyon Lower C.G.), 30 ft from the pin, open to passenger vehicles year-round.
MVUM record for FR K601 (Mills Canyon Lower C.G.): “01/01-12/31” Read against the calendar on 2026-09-22; with JavaScript your browser re-checks it against today.
From the Forest Service's own Motor Vehicle Use Map roads layer (EDW, Clearinghouse refresh Aug 30, 2026), straight-line from the pin to the nearest mapped segment. The nearest segment is not necessarily the way in, a maintenance level is the agency's class and not a report on today, and a road's season is the road's — it is not a campground order. What the levels mean → What an MVUM is →
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Harding County
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 5,133 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Harding CountyNIFC · 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 Harding County · Cibola National Forest · NM
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- @Mail12 mi
- FFuel19 mi
- GGrocery19 mi
- EVEV fast charger19 mi
- MMechanic25 mi
- WWater31 mi
- ShShower38 mi
- LLaundry43 mi
- +Urgent care43 mi
- RxPharmacy54 mi
- HHardware56 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water is a real 31-mi drive, fuel & food sit about 19 mi out.
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 — Harding County
Access
Drive-up
Land
U.S. Forest Service
Elevation
5,133 ft
Ground slope
5.2% · gentle
County
Harding County, NM
Coordinates
36.04788, -104.37602
Cost
Free
Nearby & resupply — around Harding County · Cibola National Forest · NM (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureCanadian River · ~0.1 mi · USGS: perennial river
- Nearest townMills · ~7.2 mi
- Rail & highwaynone mapped within 10 mi
- Drinking waternone within 10 mi
- FuelPhillips 66 · ~18.6 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- Groceriesnone within 30 mi
- Mapping is thin out hereAn empty row means nothing is mapped within that radius — not that nothing exists. Small stores, seasonal resorts and single fuel pumps out here often never make it onto the map. Treat these as unconfirmed and ask locally.
From the field — what Dave saw, in person
Cell service
No signal
Getting there
High clearance / 4×4
Fire ring
Yes
Toilet on site
No
Tent friendly
Yes
Verdict
Highly recommended
EV charging — from Harding County · Cibola National Forest · NM — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger18.7 mi straight-line W — Conoco Wagon Mound (Wagon Mound, NM) · Electrify America · CCS · 4 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: 24 hours daily · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reach1 within 25 mi · 1 within 50 · 64 within 100 · 134 within 150
- Nearest listing NACS (Tesla)55.0 mi — Las Vegas, NM - Tesla Supercharger, Las Vegas
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO53.8 mi — MSMEC MORA EV#1, Mora
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)55.3 mi — Angel Fire Green Lot (at a public site) · RED_E · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: not listed
- 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 124242 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Harding County · Cibola National Forest · NM — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- Vault / pit toiletMills Canyon · at this camp · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletMills Canyon Rim · ~2.2 mi NE · USFS
- Highway rest areaNHS Rest Stop 15: Ft. Union · ~29.4 mi SW
Coming out here — Harding County · Cibola National Forest · NM
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Canadian River as a perennial river, ~0.1 mi from the pin (National Hydrography Dataset, data refreshed October 2022). Mapped as perennial is not the same as flowing today. Nobody has checked it for you. Filter or boil anything you drink.
- Ground slope around the pin: about 5.2% — 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.
- 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 Harding County elsewhere
Other camps near Harding County
If this one is full, gated or washed out.
- Mills Canyon Rim Campground~2.1 mi
The unit that manages Harding County
Stay limits, road closures and fire restrictions at Harding County are set by Cibola National Forest, not by the campsite — check there before you go.
How we know this — Harding County
Source
Dave's own travels
Confidence
Researched — The record is detailed and internally consistent, and the coordinates land where the managing agency says this site is.
How it was placed
FIELD VERIFIED by Dave Lalande -- he has stood on this site. Coordinates are his own GPX track point, not a geocode. County and state confirmed against the FCC Census Block API (Harding County, NM). Everything under 'From the field' is a direct observation; nothing here is inferred from a land record.
A night on record
Dave's own GPS diary, 2017–2020: the date of the waypoint he saved here. The timestamp is UTC, so an entry saved in the evening carries the next morning's date. An observation of one night, never a forecast.
Nearest MVUM road
US Forest Service Motor Vehicle Use Map roads layer (EDW_MVUM_01, layer 1), Clearinghouse refresh Aug 30, 2026. Straight-line distance from the pin to the nearest mapped segment within 1 mi; surface type, maintenance level and open dates are the agency's own values for that segment, expanded from its codes and otherwise unedited. Nothing here says which road reaches the site.
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
Verified on the ground. Dave has stood on this one. He camped here on 27 January 2020. Conditions still change — confirm before you commit.
What we don’t know about Harding County
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.
- Whether that MVUM road is the way in, and the last stretch beyond it
- Whether the site itself closes on its own schedule — only the road's season is on record
- How many rigs actually fit
- 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
Before you go — Harding County
Finding water out here →What “dispersed” means here →Reading a forest MVUM →Picking a spot →All field notes →