Join the fun near Holtville. With tons of outdoor activities and scenic camping, this is an excellent vacation spot for all kinds of travelers. Holtville is filled with the activities, sights, and experiences to make everyone in your crew a happy camper. Find the best campgrounds near Holtville, plus reviews and photos from other campers like you.
Thank you for visiting the Hot Spring LTVA managed by the BLM El Centro Field Office. You must have a permit to camp in a designated LTVA between September 15 and April 15.
Every year, thousands of visitors come and enjoy the natural beauty and recreational opportunities offered at BLM's Long Term Visitor Areas (LTVAs), where visitors can camp for as long as seven months. The Hot Springs LTVA is known for it's historic and still active hot spring attracting both local and winter visitors.
Gecko Campground is the largest campground in the Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area. It consists of a north loop and a south loop. These loops are paved roads and offer numerous vault toilets.
Thank you for visiting the Hot Spring LTVA managed by the BLM El Centro Field Office. You must have a permit to camp in a designated LTVA between September 15 and April 15.
Every year, thousands of visitors come and enjoy the natural beauty and recreational opportunities offered at BLM's Long Term Visitor Areas (LTVAs), where visitors can camp for as long as seven months. The Hot Springs LTVA is known for it's historic and still active hot spring attracting both local and winter visitors.
Ranger
Pilot Knob RV Resort is a solid option for RV travelers, especially those affiliated with Thousand Trails or Encore campgrounds. Overall, I’d give it 4 stars, with the only downside being its remote location. Aside from the Granite Museum and the overpriced gas station at the exit, there’s not much nearby. For most necessities, you’ll need to drive into Yuma, which also involves crossing a time zone.
On the positive side, the amenities at the campground are great and seem recently renovated. The restrooms, game room, and pool area are all clean and well-maintained, and the shuffleboard courts and bocce ball are fun additions. There always seem to be organized events on the calendar, which is nice if you’re into social activities, though we didn’t attend any ourselves.
The RV sites are spacious, especially compared to other Thousand Trails locations. This makes it a great spot for those who RV part-time or full-time and enjoy a bit more room to spread out.
The staff here is incredibly friendly and helpful, and package/mail handling is seamless, which is a bonus for longer stays. The sunsets are absolutely gorgeous, and the nearby Pilot Knob hiking trails and Sand Dunes offer excellent opportunities to explore the outdoors.
Lastly, we enjoyed the breakfast buffet at the nearby casino—it was delicious and convenient, though the casino itself wasn’t our favorite for gambling.
Yuma is about a 20 minute drive.
Guide
I have been coming here for 25 years. Sadly the lake is disappearing, but it have beautiful sunsets and is isolated and peaceful ( except for the occasional train). Avoid in the summer, but winter is amazing.
Guide
We loved the spot so very much!! We will be back every winter
Traveler
We have stayed here a few times now. The best times are during the fall and winter months as the park welcomes back its community of Snow Birds coming from Canada and the northern US. During those times the atmosphere in the evening is always festive, often with live music and an outdoor bar. The staff are pleasant and accommodating. It is also a pretty good overnight spot if you are passing through in the summer, but the temperatures in this area soar during the summer and are frequently above 110 degrees. During summer time the pool becomes too warm to be refreshing, and the restaurant and bar are closed. The rates are much lower in the summer. This is also one of the few parks that accepts Passport America all days of the week. Note that Passport America discounts cannot be used with pull-through sites. The sites are fairly spacious and generally separated by hedges so you are not looking directly at your neighbor's rig. Scenery around the park is beautiful any time of year, and for those who enjoy the RV Resort lifestyle the only reason to go out of the park during the snow bird season is for groceries.
Guide
Traveling down Black Mountain road for about 2miles of wash boards before turning down the camping road.
All the sites were empty as it was almost 100degrees outside and nothing for shade of a creature larger than a bird could find. But here we found quiet solitude and a cooler evening, perhaps the winds helped.
If you have furry friends keep a watch for their paws, there’s small cacti/pokeys scattered about.
Lovely sunrise and sunset 360 views.
Good Verizon service!
Scout
Big rig friendly - lots of space to spread out. Nice areas to hike and climb. Can get rather windy and there is some smelly smoke at times from Mexico area. Can drive to Mexico for various doctor/dentist/etc. Easy drive to Yuma as well. Great deal for the winter! Present when the 'scary' situation occurred in March as noted by someone else. Involved 2 parties with dogs loose. We did not and do not feel unsafe at all here.
Scout
Most certainly a relaxing place. Lots of birds. Quite except for the store fridge compressor that ran and ran. Hosts are friendly. We were the only ones there. Expect to dry camp. There are no power hookups. The campground does have a central RV dump station, so you can dump before you hit the road. There are water hose hookups, but I would not introduce this water into your RV. It is brownish and not well treated. It is basically river water from a shallow well that ran through a sediment filter. You can wash dishes with it outside using a basin, but that's about it. I will say the community showers are great. Hot water and seemingly the same water at the sites but somehow seems clear. Anyway showers are great. Oh, one more thing, we choose a site sort of close to the store and showers. Well the store has a noisy compressor that runs pretty much 24 hours a day. Seemingly never cycles on and off. Very annoying.
Traveler
We stayed just one night while traveling through. It's about 1/4 mile from a Walmart with a few other RV parks around it. The Staff was friendly and helpful. We were able to make a reservation over the phone. We had full hook-ups (both 30 & 50 amps were available). It's a small RV camp with spaces, a pool, and a building with bathrooms (very clean), showers (use quarters), and several washers and dryers that cost $1.25 & $1 respectively. Wifi was on slower side but sufficient to stream TV shows. We paid $45.
ScoutPulled in for a night, and stayed 3. Clean camp, showers with great pressure and plenty of hot water. Stayed on the river with great access for swimming and fishing. Very quiet this time of year, also great access to BLM lands for Off road, etc, disperse camping is an option. Hosts were great.
ScoutI visited for two nights to see which version of the Slab City story to believe - There are so many videos, but most of them were made by people who did not even stay overnight.
One story is the romanticized tale of free-thinking sovereign citizens and preppers working together in Utopian Fashion to survive off the grid in the deep Sonoran Desert and shun government interference in their lives. They even have movie nights and a Saturday night open mic. There are some folks there who deserve a kind description and they work very hard to help their neighbors when they can. There just aren't enough of them.
The other story is about how hundreds of conspiracy-laden, disenfranchised, meth-heads, dependent on SSI, have trashed a 600-acre parcel of public land. This group is real too, and will solicit your sympathy and cash if they can't figure out how to siphon gas out of your tank while you're wandering Salvation Mountain.
If none of this impresses you, then by all means, visit during winter to see the clever art installations, but if you're determined to hang for longer than the day, I recommend you pay to stay at Mojo's Camp or The Ponderosa where the hosts have a care about their guests. Do Not camp alone out in the open. Do not accept any bliss from anyone, and do not flash your cash. Leave the kids at home unless you want to scare them straight.
ScoutI had a very bad scary experience here. The camphost wasn't available at 4 pm to help w a man behaving erratically, threatening my life & others.
Traveler
Lots of nice flight that spots very nice view
Traveler
4bars of T-Mobile and 2 bars on AT&T. It’s currently $50 for a night which includes the hot spring.
The lots are dirt and uneven. The water on many lots are leaking or with broken fixtures. It’s pretty quiet and I’m here for 2 nights.
Guide
Stopped in total last minute and Mojo was friendly and accommodating! I loved the vibe and although it is free to stay out in the slabs it was totally worth it to pull in here in the dark and have a place to stay. My only regret was that it was a quick stop-over and I couldn't stay longer.
If you are looking for interesting places, colorful people and friendly free roaming pets, then this is the place. I hope to stop here again in the future and spend more time with Mojo and the crew.
Scout
No water, $20 per nite with vault toliet and trash Nice cover picnic tables at each site
Guide
We loved this spot. FREE Dispersed camping is located just past power lines behind the actual hot springs. To stay at the LTVA you must have self contained trailer, van, rv…we didn’t know this. It worked out better-FREE camping and just a lil over an ¼ mile to the springs. It is well maintained by camp host Bill. Vault toilets, with TP & bonus there is great food at The Holtville Taco Shop 7 miles from springs. The Del Sol market has great marinated chicken for the BBQ and the tortillas are best outside of Mexico I have found. We will be back as the sunsets are too good not to experience over and over again…cold at night this time of year…
Guide
I was looking forward to this campground and booked five nights. There are some really nice amenities and pools. There is a golf course on site and my husband played. We left early because we felt isolated in our camp location and felt like we were not as welcome as shorter timers. Office staff cold and overcharged us.
TravelerWhat an amazing place with friendly staff. Go check out them out!! I really loved the ease of their website and reserving a spot. The check in is just as easy because you click on a link from the confirmation email sent from the reservation. Staff are always available, but never bother you. The bathrooms and showers are very clean and the hot springs tubs are nice and comfortable. There are also 3 pools, 1 hot springs and the other 2 are cold. It's definitely nice in the winter because you can do a cold soak then warm up in the hot springs. There are also dunes and ATV rentals, unless you have your own. It is definitely a homey hot springs resort with a positive vibe! Check out www.glamisnorth.com
Scout
So it’s no new news that the park has been sold and along with doing so the previous owner decided to replace the current manager Debra who in my opinion was overworked and definitely more than likely under paid considering who her boss was . My point here is why would anyone sell a place and replace their manager who did and does way more than job description. It seems as with every other business he’s sold in the community in recent years k owing it was going to be an epic failure and he’s wind back up with the business, that he has it changed his business model why sell a park and the incoming owners has to deal with a place they know nothing about or the ins and outs or the people and except to not have tons more of problems with a new hired manager who don’t know either , of course he won’t get this business back but just doesn’t seem ethical or business worthy to do so . If the new owners had this kind of thinking they’d be smart to rehire or keep if possible current management. Just my opinion it don’t matter cause I no longer am a resident of that poor town but still love the place
TravelerIt has great food and beautiful golf course.
Guide
Primitive camping. First come…, requires payment in envelope.
TravelerThe road into this campsite is long and rugged. Not worth the hassle in my honest opinion. While it does have river access with a launch ramp, the on site facility workers are less than friendly. Everyone had a terrible attitude which really was a bummer. Will never come back.
GuideArea was nice, no trash, host was nice, the only thing was there was A LOT OF FLIES. Other than the flies it’s an good campground, there are pit toilets across the street at the hot springs along with trash cans.
Guide
Good if you need to get off the highway to catch some sleep. People shoot here so there’s shells, rusty metal, and broken glass everywhere.
Traveler
This is a nice RV resort. It has heated pool during the winter and hot tub is always hot, and also open 24 hrs. Great laundry 1.75 for wash and dry, need a card. Unfortunately close to airport. Military jets take off and landing. Very noisy, but just for a short amount of time. It starts at around 8:30 in the morning and ends around 10:00 pm at night. They do not run all day long. Just a few planes take off and land. I like that it is close to Walmart, plus the RV park will take your shopping cart back for you, just leave your cart in front of your site, and then it’s gone. Great dog park. Nice running track next to RV park. RV’s are close during peak season. We are here late in season so we are practically the only camper here. Great staff and they even bring your mail to you. No extra charge. You can do Amazon and UPS. Those drivers will bring it to your site rather than drop off at the office.
Guide
Such a wonderful spot in the middle of the desert! Has a large pool and big hot tub all inside of a solid wall to prevent sand from blowing inside. Each spot is surrounded by trees which is very rare to find in the desert! It makes each spot private and helps hugely with keeping wind from blowing dirt into your spot. Very affordable as well! Debra at the front was just the sweetest thing… helped us find a perfect spot, gave us multiple brochures and mapped out local spots that we should check out. Borrego springs is about 25 minutes away. Phone service is spotty for ATT and Tmobile, but you’ll have better service at the front of the campground. Overall a very peaceful stay with lots of stars at night!
Scout$850 a month. Very expensive food and drink. There is a nice little store in Seeley though. Huge piles of slash and garbage mixed in at the south side.
Camping near Holtville, California, offers a unique blend of desert landscapes and outdoor adventures. Whether you're looking for a quiet spot to unwind or a place to explore, there are several campgrounds that cater to different needs.
Camping near Holtville, California, has something for everyone, from families to solo adventurers. Just be sure to plan ahead and enjoy the beautiful desert scenery!
Frequently Asked Questions
What camping is available near Holtville, CA?
According to TheDyrt.com, Holtville, CA offers a wide range of camping options, with 96 campgrounds and RV parks near Holtville, CA and 26 free dispersed camping spots.
Which is the most popular campground near Holtville, CA?
According to TheDyrt.com, the most popular campground near Holtville, CA is Rio Bend RV & Golf Resort with a 4.4-star rating from 5 reviews.
Where can I find free dispersed camping near Holtville, CA?
According to TheDyrt.com, there are 26 free dispersed camping spots near Holtville, CA.
What parks are near Holtville, CA?
According to TheDyrt.com, there are 4 parks near Holtville, CA that allow camping, notably Cleveland National Forest and San Bernardino National Forest.
