Best RV Parks & Resorts near Ocate, NM

Nice park nestled at the foot of the mountains and on the banks of the Red River. Nicely landscaped with two ponds and a river walk. Location is great for visiting Rio Grande del Norte NM and the Wild Rivers Recreation Area. Just north of Taos too. Nicely shaded, level sites with full hookups. Nice picnic table and grill. Might be a little tight for big rigs, but my little Casita was quite happy. Very friendly folks in the office. Clean laundry and restroom. My site backed up to the river and the sound of the rushing water was the perfect lullaby.

I loved my stay here. This location is so prime for visiting all the sights in Taos, and there are many.  The campground is compact but still, private. There are several pull-thru sites for big rigs, many back-in sites with water/elec. hookups, and some tent sites in the back of the campground and a few sites at the front by the office that are back-in without any amenities.

There is a dump station, a dishwashing area, bathrooms with very hot showers, a playground, and office. No open fires are allowed only propane or other contained fires. Cell phone service and wifi thru the campground is available tho not fast when everyone jumps on at the same time. During my stay everyone was very quiet.  My only complaint was a light that stayed on all night for security.

Restaurants are really close enough to walk to and there is an Ace Hardware store across the street for emergency repairs. Old Town Taos is 3 miles away.

This is one of only a few RV parks in the immediate area of the city of Taos. This campground had positive reviews, and the photos looked nice, so we chose it. As other people indicated, the park is clean, and reasonably spacious for a private campground. There were buddy sites so your traveling partners could have coaches facing one another, which is also nice. 

There was ample room to park both our fifth wheel and our truck. The sites we had were concrete and level(we were traveling with others, and their site at a different area of the park was dirt/rock and much less level). There was good Verizon and AT&T cell service in the park as well. 

I don’t use park WiFi, the laundry rooms, or the bathrooms so I cannot comment on that(although people we were traveling with said they were nice). My issue with this park is the way they charge. 

Their website indicates a certain charge for 30 amp sites, 50 amp sites, pull-thrus and back-ins. Also, some had sewer, and some did not. Not until we got there did we discover that although we had paid for a premium spot with 50 amp power and sewer, that the cost of the electricity itself was NOT included in the price. This was not prominently indicated on their website. Their policy/procedure was to take a meter reading each day, and that cost was added to the camper’s bill at the end of their stay. I understand that many campgrounds do this for monthly campers, and even weekly. I have NEVER seen this at a campground on a daily rate. I have been all over the country, staying at private campgrounds from coast to coast, and this was the only one that I have ever seen that charged for electricity on a daily rental. I brought this to their attention, and their attitude was, “that’s the way we do it” and was terse about it. The actual dollar amount was not great, about$2/night...but that was based upon our usage. 

We had people traveling with us that used their air conditioner(we did not) and it was about$5/night. They have every right to do this, but it goes against the industry standard that I have seen everywhere else. So, I am only giving this campground 2 stars because of that. If it weren’t for that, I would give it 4 stars. Take this information and use it how you choose. 

We stayed in a 35’ fifth wheel.

We had a blast staying here. 23 ft travel trailer Water from hydrants only, no connections, no dump, and they clean vault toilets Hiking trails from the campground Host was very knowledgeable and helpful

Some sites are short, very few are level, some have a steep slope. Good shade and sun mix , mature trees, nice creek flows through the campground , it’s very pretty and relaxing. The loop to the left side near the host is more level and can handle bigger RVs but overall this is not a big rig campground. Some rigs could not get level…….

Lots of places to explore nearby.

We will stay again

This Forest Service Campground is less than ten miles from the Santa Fe Plaza and is, thus, very popular and very busy. It should be noted that about half of this distance is on a somewhat steep, but very good road. Most of the sites are reservable, and are reserved well in advance, but there are some hard-to-get, first-come sites. The campground is smaller and the sites are fairly close together, but the vegetative undercover gives some visual separation, and, during our stay, it was fairly quiet except for the several generators that often make there presence known during the evenings. Generator hours, if there are any, seem to be very generous. It would certainly be nice to have generator-free zones. The campground has very nice tree cover and, because of the elevation, is cool even during mid summer. The campsites are well laid out with a picnic table and fire ring and well-designed tent sites. There are water spigots throughout but none were able to provide water during our stay. It is unclear whether there will be water available in the future, but, during our stay we had to haul in any water that we needed. There is no dump station in the campground, but next door, at the State Park, there is a dump station open at times, for a charge of$10 per use. The dump station has the gates closed, but can be accessed, after paying the fee at the park, by simply sliding open the latches on the gates. There are vault toilets, but you will want a mask to use them, not because of COVID, but because of the gag-producing odor. You will need a strong stomach to frequent these facilities. This is a real shame in an otherwise nice campground. It is not really that hard to keep toilets like these clean and decent smelling. There are camp hosts, but on a busy Friday night when we arrived, they were no where to be seen and were not much of a presence in the campground. They do provide a greeting of a really trashed-up campsite and a beware of dog sign. This is another indictment of the poor Forest Service management and rather sad since this could be such a very nice campground if well managed. There is no cell service with Verizon in the Campground. There is a nice two-mile loop hike that can be accessed directly from the campground and several other hikes that are available in the State Park next door. In addition, there are several nice hikes nearby in the National Forest. Even with the several criticisms noted above, this is a nice campground and well worth a visit. Just plan well in advance with reservations or get very lucky with a first-come site.