Cactus Forest Dispersed

This was like being able to backcountry camp in Saguaro NP. We got in after dark & overshot the turn in, but looped back around. Our site was great - quiet & peaceful. We enjoyed waking up to the literal forest of cactus.

Remote, private, and free but accessible. Not a standard RV parking lot campground but rather several campsites with ample space between them for privacy, along an unpaved sandy road, just off a quiet paved back road. About 20-30min from gas stations, water, food, etc. It has no facilities or even pit toilets. Exactly what I wanted. This campground is aptly named as it is quite literally in the middle of a Saguaro cactus forest 🌵 along with many other different cactus species and wildlife. This location is tranquil and wild. I couldn't think of a better way to immerse yourself in the middle of this national park than this campground. It's a tight drive in if you go past the 2-3 RV sites at the beginning of the east side. I have a 2015 Toyota Tacoma with a roof top tent pulling a 12x6 enclosed trailer with standard wheels. My trailer made it through without scratches and at no point did I even think about four-wheel drive. A larger camper I couldn't speak for. It is quite sandy and has some mogul sections where the water flows have washed some of the trail away but overall an easy drive.

Disclosures and warnings:

There are three sides to this campground. The east side, west side, and North end. The West side is the most trailer friendly and most visited as it is where the GPS leads you. However, it gets worse the deeper you go in after roughly 10-15 sites. The east side you could probably manage a trailer for the first 2-3 sites. After that there would be no where to turn around and it gets rough off-road quick, like deep dried up sandy river bed crossings (month of May) and is more exposed to the sun with slightly less cacti than the west side. The North end is the most private and remote of the other two and the quietest. However, it is nothing short of a four-wheel drive off-road trail. I would not recommend anything other than off road vehicles in the north end and the sites are small, just for tents or 1 vehicle.

There are almost no rocks to worry about on the way in but the cacti here are more than capable of creating flat tires so take care to avoid pieces that have fallen onto the road. Especially the Jumping Cholla cacti! They are the worst things you will come across in this campground and are everywhere, easily the most dominant species of cactus in this area. They have evolved to break apart into spiny segments when they make contact with someone or something to propagate. Sometimes if the wind blows strong enough they cover the ground around their base with a mound of their spined segments. These segments often roll or blow into the roadways. The spines are hard as stone and sometimes over 2 in long. They have evolved special reversed barbs that you can't see with your eyes on every main spine. They go into anything except metal, including Kevlar reinforced tire sidewalls like a knife through hot butter and then hook in and don't come out unless you rip them out. I rode my adventure bike through the campground to explore, lost my footing in the sand and fell against one of these. I had 3-4 segments stuck to my arm. I spent 10 to 15 minutes ripping these segments out of my arm, pulling my skin away from my body about an inch before they will rip out. Don't make the same mistake as me.

GUNS! In my opinion the biggest downside to this campground is the almost constant gunfire all day long as there is a public shooting area on the south west side of the campground. If you are in the west side and you are looking southwest, there is a tiny little mountain ridgeline about a half mile away. All around the base of that ridgeline people are allowed to pull up and shoot at targets on the hill side. The locals show up as the sun just comes over the trees around 5:00 a.m. and they don't stop until the sun sets almost everyday of the week. They do however, quit at night so you can sleep.

If you camp here you are IN THE desert. During the day is fine. You will likely only run into swarms of flies. At night however, is a different story. ESPECIALLY If you decide to have a fire on a cold night or set up a lantern near the ground while making dinner. I stayed here for 9 days straight and I came across 6 rattlesnakes (mostly sidewinders), more camel spiders than I can count (at least 5+ per night), 3 brown recluse spiders, packs of coyotes rolling through at night and early morning (watch your pets), and 2 killer bee swarms in the trees. All within the campground boundaries, so just be ready for rugged camping.

For a girl born in the Midwest, this campground was amazing to wake up to. Saguaros everywhere! Plenty of sites big and small, decent road, fire rings, plenty of privacy.

Beautiful desert spot. Lots of gun fire during the day. Fantastic desert sunsets 🌇.

Not that far of a drive from a highway exit, I was pleasantly surprised by the peaceful seclusion. Lots of pull outs for you to park and the road wasn’t so bad (I do have a high clearance jeep so idk what it would be like for everyone….).

If you want saguaros this is the perfect place for you. Awesome dispersed camping. Watch out for jumping chollas and keep your furry friends close. But breathtaking view all around you!

Beautiful Cactus all around. Mountains in the distance. Road a little narrow but I saw great spots all around.

Plenty of space and very quiet. Best for small RVs/Campervans Gorgeous scenery and Mtns

It's great to come here and spend some time relaxing and hiking. This area is about 30 minutes away from Rilloto for supplies. Picacho Peak State park is 20 minutes away for hiking. Overall, it is a quiet area with beautiful views.

You turn off a paved road onto a dirt road. The dirt road is well maintained and any kind of camper should be able to navigate. There are plenty of large sites as well as just areas to pull a vehicle through. Tent camping would be great here with all the saguaros.

The road goes back for about 2 miles and the sites are spaced well. The dirt road was great for a morning run or bike ride.

There are no services. Pack in, Pack out. Verizon service was good.

So incredibly beautiful! Easy to find with the coordinates, roads are tight and you need to drive slow, but you could get in even with low clearance to the spots near the front, you’ll need higher clearance if you keep going down the road.

Incredibly gorgeous, it feels like you’re on another planet.

We came out here yesterday to camp but a big storm rolled in. We scouted the area and a lot of the spots have pretty soft sand. If it wasn't starting to storm we would have stayed but with the type of sand there... we were pretty sure our 24 ft TT being pulled by our 2wd truck would have gotten stuck. Besides that it looked beautiful, wish we could have stayed, saguaros and cholla EVERYWHERE as you drive down the road. Looks awesome!

-Youtube: Likely Lost

It is indeed a cactus forest. I pulled in late 10pm. There were a handful of campers before arriving at an empty space. 20 foot tall cacti were silhouetted against the horizon. There were a few times I could her bursts from automatic rifles but they were pretty far away.

Beautiful stay. Great views. It is dispersed camping for miles! We were able to find a spot really quick. The coyotes came out at night and people were shooting all day/night by the mountain range but it didn’t bother us! Definitely coming back! :)

Setup my pop up here and left within an hour. Hand gun and rifle noise was nearly non stop, but not the worst of it. We also endured listening to some sort of loud boom like a firework and the sound of some sort of repeating fire. Very pretty area with abundant saguaro, too bad about the noise!

We were disappointed to get to Arizona and see all the trash at most of the other dispersed sites west and north of Phoenix and were going b line it out of here, but needed to get some work done for the night and ended up here.

Wow! Whole different beauty. The cactuses are tall, the skies are blue blue during the day and of course there’s amazing sunsets. There’s tons of spots to choose from out here and for being out in the middle no where, way clean (something AZ is not). Thought we’d only camp here for a night, but ended up staying for 4.

The service is pretty good too. I have AT&T and got 2-3 bars in the spot we chose (it can be spotty here and there around this area). My partner has Verizon and got 3-4 bars in the spot we chose.

I would definitely come back and recommend camping here.

I stayed here for one night and absolutely loved it. So easy to find with the coordinates. Enough people around that if I felt like I had an emergency I could ask for help but also had enough of my own space to have privacy. The view was gorgeous. Enjoy!

This dispersed camping area is actually on the Cattle Tanks road south of Park Links road. The side two- track sandy roads are very narrow and bordered by dense chain fruit cholla plants. This area is not a good choice for dogs and their owners. Also shooting is in the background like everyday. Access for TTs down narrow side roads would be risky.

Had no issues finding the place, you can see the campground signage off the paved road when it turns off into the dirt road. A few campers were present on a weekday, had to drive a ways down to find a spot for my trailer, but I did find a great pull through. Only concern is lack of turnaround for big rigs and trailers, and loose sand pockets on some parts of the road which seems to get worse the farther you go. Make sure you power through that sand at speed if you are in a front wheel drive. Scout ahead for turn around. Very quiet night, coyotes abound, as well as cactuses and insects.

It’s a nice spot plenty of places to setup. You will probably feel better having a gun as we heard coyotes from 3 directions of us.

This is dispursed camping carry in carry out very remote dirt roads. Would be very difficult for a large Class A or larger Class C. Mostly small campers and tents.😎😁

easy to find, tons of spots, super quiet.

It has what's seems like endless road of dispersed camp sites with endless cacti of any/ every kind... It is no cost and forthe ones who have animals it has a fence yard in the first and second spots for public use...BY FAR ME AND MINES favorite place thus far... Four thumbs up

We loved this site. The road was fine for our 17’ trailer and spots are spread out well. A few other campers and some shooting in the distance but overall an excellent and free option. Lots of beautiful cactus and excellent stargazing.

Okay BLM site. Campsites are scattered along the dirt road. I have no idea how far the little narrow dirt road goes, but as long as you can find a place to park, I think your good. Quite dense with cactus and many of the sites are kind of pull throughs. Biosphere II is about 28 miles to the east, so it was a good spot to camp at for free and then drive to my tour in the AM.

We stayed here in January 2021 during our visit to Saguaro National Park due to previous good reviews. Classic BLM-style camping, meaning no amenities, dispersed, and pack out all waste.

This campground’s name is quite apt; it is indeed a cactus forest, and a beautiful one at that. However, watch where you step AND where you drive!!!! Some places are hairier than others, but we were very careful for our own safety and for the livelihood of the Saguaros, as young ones are quite tiny and need to be protected. We were traveling with our cat, and we usually let him walk around campsites with us, but decided it was not worth the risk at this campground. I would avise against dogs roaming here as well.

This is a great campground if you are just looking to get away for the weekend or want a quaint, quiet campground amongst incredible Saguaros. However, I personally prefer the BLM Pipeline campground to this one, as it’s more spread out, has less opportunity for cactus stepping, and has a much better proximity to Saguaro NP (especially the East park/Tucson Mountain Park).

Really cool place tucked away felt like a cactus tunnel and you can't beat free. Cell service was spotty to non existent.

My only advice here is that it’s not fun for dogs. (And maybe not fun for kids either?) It’s incredibly prickly everywhere. Imagine that, prickly in the cactus forest? You’ll want to avoid wearing sandals too. (I found myself with a piece of a cactus stuck to my foot and then when trying to remove it I got my hand stuck to the cactus that was stuck to my foot. Tools were required. Pain, lots of pain.) Seriously, NO SANDALS. But! PROS: the saguaro cactus are huge and impressive. We really enjoyed driving through this area at sunset and seeing all the iconic cactus. But then our overnight of camping on this random BLM land was just hours of dodging prickles. It’s quite an interesting place, but fair warning, is prickly. Act accordingly.

We were surprised on the number of people who ventured out to this BLM spot off Park Link Road in the Cactus Forest over a rainy weekend in Tucson.

The first dozen dispersed spots were full with camper vans, small trailers and trucks. We continued to drive down the gravel dirt road to a more secluded spot. We didn’t see anyone in our one-night stay beside a mountain biker in the morning.

Even though It was raining in the area for about 24 hours before we travelled to the campsite, we didn’t have any issues navigating the 1.5 miles down to the site we chose. The truck has some mud in it and the 4x4 wasn’t needed (but made it easier). I would recommend a high clearance vehicle to reach the further back spots. Also, the road was narrow, our F250 brushed a few bushes on the way.

Most dispersed sites had a fire ring (check locally fire conditions first). I’d suggest bringing in fire wood unless you just want to burn the few fallen twig and limbs. It’s a cactus forest- so the terrain is mostly saguaros, chollas, Palo verde trees and shrubs.

Our site had a beautiful view of the sunset and a view of Picacho Peak in the distance. We visited in February and the weather was nice (on the chilly side) for our roof top tent. I wouldn’t come here in the summer unless we had a rig with air conditioning. Impressive view of the stars at night. Some traffic noise from I-10.

No water, toilets, or trash. So be prepared to take out what you bring in. We had 2 bars of LTE slcell service with T-Mobile.

It’s BLM land close to Tucson, so locals use the area for gun target practice. We heard gun shots until the sunset and starting again the morning. It was basically non-stop. If you want a place to shoot, this would be a good spot to camp.

🌵 Saguaro Facts: Saguaros can live to be 150-200 years old and grow as tall at 40 feet. A 10 year old saguaro Is about 1.5 inches tall (please watch where you drive, park and step). At 80 years old, it’s around 6 feet tall and starts to bloom. The best time to see saguaro blooms is mid-May through mid-June. At age 95-100, it’s around 15 feet tall and starts to grow it’s first arm. 🌵