Best Equestrian Camping near Cottonwood, AZ

The boss lady and I are full time and have stayed here multiple times. The staff and park are always amazing. The sites are level and most have a nice layer of rock on them.  There is an awesome pool and clubhouse, pickle ball courts, playgrounds and trails to explore. You are only 10 minutes from Cottonwood 30 minutes from Sedona 30 minutes to Prescott and an hour and a half to Phoenix. Passport America gets you 6 days at about $20 a night. Verizon and AT&T work awesome here. The laundry works on an app on your phone so no quarters to carry. Only downside is I-17 is way to close constant road noise when you're outside.

The forest was closed in Northern Arizona so I decided to camp out at Dead Horse Ranch SP.  I was pretty pleased overall with my trip.  My campsite was comfortable and private enough, considering how close the sites are at this campground.  I had some shade trees to help keep my travel trailer cool but definitely needed to run the AC all night in order to stay comfortable.  The RV sites here have fresh water and power, but no sewer.  There is a dump station at the park entrance that is easily accessible when both entering and exiting the park. I enjoyed fishing, hiking, and bike riding while I was here but had to limit my outdoor activities to the morning hours due to the heat.  

One afternoon I went into old town Cottonwood, which is only a couple of miles from the park.  It's a great place to visit if you're into antiques or wine tasting.

We pulled into our spot at Dead Horse Ranch as the temps crept below freezing. This was our first night ever in a campervan, and we were feeling very fortunate for scoring the last site with electricity. 

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It snowed in the night (February) and we woke to discover that the bathhouse was heated with free hot showers. This, combined with dishwashing stations (again with hot water) and friendly campground hosts, made for a lovely stay at Dead Horse Ranch.

The only downside was the lack of privacy between sites - fine for van or RV camping, but not ideal for tenters. 

There are a couple of nice trails in the park, one leading into Old Town Cottonwood - try Old Town Cafe for their flaky croissants! Dead Horse Ranch is about 30 minutes from Sedona and fantastic hiking, which we took advantage of all three nights we were there. 

Bottom line, this was not a wilderness experience, but Dead Horse Ranch provides nice sites and great amenities, and you can't beat the convenience of the location. 

We preferred the Red Tailed Hawk loop to all the others, and really liked sites 57 - 64 for the views and access to trails.

We spent 3 nights here, using our camp spot as a"command center" for exploring the area around Cottonwood(including Sedona, Jerome, Montezuma's Castle, Tuzigoot, etc. etc.) We kept busy and were really not"home" during many daylight hours, but it was a great base to return to each evening. Dead Horse Ranch State Park has A LOT of camping spots, and can accomodate pretty much any vehicle. We were in a pull through site(31) that we really liked. The only surprise was that our nicely blacktopped spot was not very level...we had to put two blocks under the front passenger tire and one under the rear passenger tire. Hardly the end of the world though. One night we were there was Monday night, and folks were outside enjoying grilling and watching the game. But nothing ever got anything close to rowdy. It was a very quiet campground, and even though every site was full, and honestly, the space between sites is only about average, we never felt squeezed in or encroached upon. Every site has a picnic table and a grill. The electric and water hookups were fine(water pressure not the best I've ever had, but more than okay). Because it's such a busy place for camping, the two dump stations on the way out of the park DO sometimes have a wait. And one of them doesn't have access to water, which is tough when you prefer to also backflush your black tank.

The park itself is lovely, but unless you like fishing, probably won't hold you there too long. It's more as a quiet, inexpensive pretty place to stay rather than a destination in and of itself. We walked around a couple of lagoons and enjoyed some bird activity...but I would say don't think of this place as the be-all, end-all of your trip. But you're 30ish minutes to Sedona, 20ish minutes to Jerome, etc. We would certainly stay here again.