Best Tent Camping near Yucca Valley, CA

To get to Black Rock Campground in Joshua Tree, you have to take a separate road into it from Yucca Valley. So if you are planning on spending a lot of time in the park and don't want to drive back and forth, this probably isn't a good choice for you. There's running water and flushing toilets in the bathroom. Views overlook the valley below, which is nice at night. Not a lot of shade. After all, this is a desert campground, with desert plants. Picnic tables and a fire pit. Flat places to lay a tent. Some trails go off from the campground. We chose to drive into the park. This was a good place to introduce my friend to his first camping experience. We ended up going into town (pretty close) for dinner. (Cheaters, I know!) The other plus about this campground is it's one of few that take reservations in Joshua Tree. So if you don't like knowing whether you have a site or not, you can be certain you'll have one when you arrive here if you make a reservation.

Offers wide range of tent camp sites, RV camping, showers, toilets. Beautiful scenic hikes. Small creek runs through property. Campsite grills and picnic tables.

We tent camped here for 3 nights and loved this campground. The tent sites are spacious - can’t exaggerate that enough. the workers were friendly and helpful. The bathrooms were clean and had plenty of showers available. There is a playground centrally located, tennis court and basketball - all equipment available from the office. They also had board games for use and a pool table inside. There are a couple of pontoon boats available for rental as well! We took out kids on a couple hikes, be sure you have an interagency pass for parking at trailheads! Fantastic getaway!

Overall a nice campground with decent sites, but really not for tent camping at all. They say they have some tent sites, but pretty much every site is setup with gravel pull-in or pull throughs which you'd not really want to set your tent up on. They do have a "tent village" which you can camp on, but again, not really ideal for tents. They do have really nice facilities for washing your cloths or yourself along with a nice club house for unwinding. While each site doesn't have a fire ring, you do have a table and there is a group fire ring along with a pool and playground. You are a bit inside the city of Banning and not too far from the train tracks, so if you're not in something super insulated you'll probably hear a bit of train noise like we did.

The winning factors for this campground are:

$15 per person/nightly

Really nice staff 👍🏼

A beautiful entry at night, one permanent residence opposite the office has a lovely succulent/cactus garden and the whole garden is pleasingly lit with tiny colored lights.

There is a tiny "lake" with reeds and visiting birds who congregate around the water. Fishing offered, but no swimming.

I spent a very serene time with just myself and my cat. There are so many tent spaces available, it's quite easy to make a camp and stay isolated from other campers. For winter, the location is pleasantly warm during daytime and any site will be nice. But be aware that in summer the sites ideally situated with trees are much more limited.

They have many types of site sections—loads of tent spots, a very tree'd and full hookup area for RVs, and there is also a "dry" RV section with no hookups.

The main bathroom and shower houses are kept very spic and span and there are also a couple outdoor dishwashing stations available. All the plumbed amenities are available for all campers at the park.

One wish that I would really appreciate would be the availability of a 110v outlet bank out in the tent camping area, or wherever putting one in would be feasible. I travel with a mobile freezer and a deep cycle marine battery. Not fully solarized yet, but I do have an inverter, and I really love when I can camp in places that offer electric only sites at a substantial discount off of full hookup sites.

I would happily pay an extra $5per night just to hook up my super efficient mobile fridge/freezer. Er, that is, my cat's mini freezer...it's for her special order frozen🥩 meat 🐈. I just use the little fridge section for the occasional tub of hummus, chunk of cheese, etc.

Overall, this is a very pleasant oasis, slightly off the beaten, no big highway noise. And Joshua Tree, Ca. is just a few minutes downhill where all the small town eateries can be found.

There's also a decent Dollar General store nearby that has the best prices for buying ice.

Slater Bros market in nearby Yucca Valley has hardwood firewood boxes and reasonable prices on all the extras–Firestarter blocks, compressed wood logs, and long nose lighter wands. Gas stations also sell wood, but it's not hardwood, nor fully cured. So that stuff burns up really quick and can be very smoky.

As for this sweet little campground, it's a nice place to get away to, and to have a sense of spaciousness. You might here the eerie, lonesome yips and cries of some coyotes in the distance, to boot.

And I sure can't beat the price for tent camping.

Best place ever!! Tent camping, RV camping, they have a restaurant and bar, best burgers in all of southern California!! They also have a small store, there's showers, restrooms and a swimming pool! Tent camping along Santa Ana River, you can also fish and hike. So amazing and beautiful, awesome memories made!!

Does not allow tent camping

Good home base for Joshua Tree is NP campgrounds are full. Pretty barebones. A few weirdos, but enough space to steer clear of them. The wind can be brutal if you’re tent camping. Have large stakes.

Awesome tent sites in Joshua Tree, tucked between some Jumbo Rocks. The sites are pretty spacious and private and have primo scenery and star gazing opportunities.

Super nice staff!! They remembered us after only staying here twice which means they take pride in the care for their customers. We love that we can tent camp by the water!

Will definitely recommend to anyone!

Nice place to visit in early January. With sunshine and daytime temperatures of 60s and 70s. Most sites are suitable for tent camping or small campers.

Would be a 5 star if it had water, a dump station or electric.

This is your typical regional park Campground. There’s a lot to do here, including fishing, playgrounds, and even a waterpark in the summer. The bathrooms are decent, no showers.

We stayed in group campsite A. Tent camping is only allowed in group sites. They do have about 30 to 40 RV sites as well. The tent camping sites come with plenty of space for group camping. There’s a built-in grill and running water.

There’s no larger wildlife, like bears, so less stressful when you have pets or kids. Plenty of space to bring bikes and ride around. There’s a large community park right next-door where you can go and play baseball, basketball, sand volleyball, or frisbee.

We’ve been here several times over the last few years and really enjoy a nice quiet place close to home.

Super campspots among the boulders. Great hiking out of the campground. Some of the tent sites are "really" walk in sites so it makes it a bit more challenging if sleeping in van. Bring everything you need ie. Water!

Very primitive camping, but location, views, hikes, and adventures nearby make it all worth it! We had site #6 and tent camped. It was back a little away from the road and people which was nice. Be sure to bring in your own water. We filled up our jug and got provisions in 29 Palms before heading into the park.

While I fully appreciated the location, the scenery, the quaint community of Idyllwild, the campsites were TOO close and on hills making relaxing and tent camping a bit of a downer. It felt like we were right on top of each other. We had loud campers on 2/3 sites near us. I don’t think I would camp here again.

This listing was showing as free but when we showed up that was not the case. For simple tent camping, this cost $15/person and charge $5/per kid and pet. Must be gone by 11am. Overpriced for what we needed. Very loud and rude campers next to us until early morning hours evens though it’s against the park’s policies. Disappointed. Front lady checking in was very pleasant. No discounts for Veterans, only active duty.

very nice campground. Always clean. Small store onsite. Small lake. Some sites are full hook-ups and many tent sites. Quiet and peaceful. I’ve stayed many times - September, October & May. The Joshua Tree Music Festival takes over the campground for a week in October and a week in May. Wonderful time to stay and hear such a huge variety of music and art!

Such an amazing spot to tent camp! Definitely narrow spots for bigger vehicles, but for car-camping with tents, it was perfect! Scored this site on a busy weekend using Dyrt Alerts - the pictures say it all: secluded site, epic sunrise & sunset viewing from scaling the rocks in the campsite, beautiful star-gazing. I will say that despite the "secluded" feel, our neighbors were still really close and noisy late into the night, but the greatness of our site honestly outweighed that disruption for me personally.

We did have a coyote visitor twice in the morning, so don't forget to keep your food/trash locked up from critters!