Van Camping and Public Lands
- July 2020
- Van Living Hi Steph Simple Living
I like the idea of living in a van. But I don’t like the idea of staying at RV parks. I can’t figure out how all these pictures show vans camping in wide open spaces. Where do you guys find yourself staying most of the time? Maybe there is a link to something I should read but I just haven’t found it. Thank you in advance.
Walker
Hi Walker,
Public lands offer much of the excellent camping in the States. Unless there are signs that indicate otherwise, you are allowed to camp in pullouts or existing sites on Forest Service land and Bureau of Land Management land, which is known as dispersed camping. Dispersed camping is the term used for camping anywhere in the National Forest OUTSIDE of a designated campground. Dispersed camping means there are no toilets, no picnic tables, no trash cans, no treated water, and no fire grates. Here’s a great resource from the US Forest Service Website with more guidelines, and on this mainpage, you can select by region to get interactive maps you can use to find National Forest camping areas across the US.
If you’re on the move, you can also use Google maps to locate a region that is National Forest or BLM, and look for little pullouts along dirt roads in likely-looking areas (trailheads will usually be a disappointment, because they are generally posted with no camping, especially in areas like Colorado and California). If you’re freestyling like this, it’s a good idea to make sure you have daylight to check out the area once you get there. I’ve found some great overnight sleeping spots during long drives by doing this. I’ve been on trips where we planned our travel from lake to lake, as long as they were within reason of our proposed route, and had some wonderful evenings and mornings in beautiful spots I’d never considered visiting before.
The beauty of dispersed camping is the simplicity–you are totally self contained, and you can enjoy solitude and open space. You do need to make sure you have everything you need, and also practice Leave No Trace procedures, so you leave your spot as nice as you found it. But if you take the time to get your van set up well, you are going to be totally self contained, and you can just enjoy the freedom and simplicity of the less populated places you find.
Enjoy! Steph
