Best Cabin Camping near Guadalupe Mountains National Park

If you haven't yet discovered the beauty of the chihuahuan desert, the Carlsbad KOA is a great place to hang your hat while you explore.

I often stay in camping cabins at KOA's while on road trips with my children. We like having a bed to spread our sleeping bags out on sometimes, access to AC after a hot day of exploration and the kids like a chance to 'plug in' while we are unplugged....

Carlsbad KOA is big, but it has adequate bathrooms and showers for the size, and they were in very good shape when we visited in June 2016. There is a pool, laundry, all the amenities you need if you are RVing, a game room and food on site. If you like camp cabins, the cabins had grills, picnic tables, the usual double + set of bunks (bring your own bedding), and AC.

Campground was peaceful. The great tailed grackels were courting and whistling, quail wandered through and rabbits romped around our cabin.

If you are in this area, visit the Living Desert State Park and Zoo and of course Carlsbad Caverns - stay and watch the bats fly out in the evening.

The only drawback on this KOA was that the wifi signal was spotty at our cabin, and I had some work to do. If you are taking an ACTUAL vacation, it wouldn't be an issue!

This RV spot is right in town on the Main Street. It is gated, has friendly staff, two cabins, tent spaces, a store, super clean and nice bathrooms/showers, laundry facility and pool.

This is not typical wooded or beautiful camping, it’s a place to park your RV or tent and that is just about right. If you are making a quick stop over or heading to Carlsbad Caverns then what more do you need?

We stayed in the cabin because we didn’t want to get all our camping stuff out for a quick overnight before we head to our destination (SW CO). It was only $15 more than tent camping so it made sense. It was also raining hard when we got here so we were double grateful. The cabins have a double bed and a bunk bed. It has a TV that we never turned on, a fridge, microwave and AC. The mattresses are like the ones you find at camp, wrapped in plastic but we just put our bedding and memory foam on top of it and it was just fine. I’d recommend it because it was just what we needed on our way and at a good price. Also the shower/ bathrooms are probably the nicest I’ve ever seen at a campground.

Let's start with the fact that there are few actually camping areas close to Carlsbad Caverns or Guadalupe National Park. Assuming travelers are coming to Carlsbad to see these great places, the location becomes a major player. Fine print: there is a small campground (absolutely no amenity campground) in Guadalupe National Park which is first-come, first-serve (aka: full), and there a campground in White's City--although having driven past it, I don't think I want to stay there.

Carlsbad RV Park is primarily an RV Park. In fact, while we were there, they were bulldozing their only tent sites and I'm not sure if they are upgrading them or replacing them with more RV sites. So the "tent" site status is tentative. As with most RV Parks, the RVs are crammed in, side by side, and really the place is like an RV parking lot with amenities and hook-ups--but they do appear to be mostly pull through and the staff will show the way to go to pull through without hiccups. These are not spacious by any means. We stayed in one of two cabins, which were very reasonably priced, esp. when comparing to Carlsbad KOA. They even came with a cable and a fridge.

The RV Park (like all of the RV Parks in Carlsbad) has overall become a residence for the oil field workers, so be prepared to try and sleep through the 4 a.m. traffic rush out of camp to oil field. However, the neighbors are pleasant and quiet to have, even if they must drive away before the roosters announce the coming of the sun.

The park has gated access and we felt very safe during our stay. There is a playground that was being bulldozed with the tent site; I am unsure if it is being upgraded or eliminated. There is a camp store, a pool, a game room, showers (which were ok), laundry, a dishwashing sink, picnic tables at the cabins, and universal fire pit. Please note that I am inherently biased against parking lot style RV parks--so 2 stars from me for an RV Park is quite a compliment.

Carlsbad RV Park and Carlsbad KOA direct comparison: we have stayed at both the Carlsbad KOA and the Carlsbad RV Park. The KOA is NOT actually in Carlsbad, and is over an hour away from Carlsbad Caverns and 30 minutes from town. On the other hand, the RV Park is at the southern end of town and only 30 minutes to the Caverns. While the KOA lots are more spacious, they offer no more and no fewer amenities than the RV Park…well the KOA sort-of offers meals but the RV Park is right in town, so delivery is an option. The basic, no frill KOA cabins cost double the RV Park charges. Additionally, the KOA staff was not as friendly or as helpful as the RV Park staff, imho.

While in Carlsbad check out Fiesta Drive-In for one of America's few remaining drive-in movie theaters.

Arrived here, after 6PM, on a last minute reservation Severe thunderstorms in area Check In was smooth and friendly. Staff advised us game room would remain open all night, In case tenters wanted to have a dry place Ownwer offered us A Deluxe Cabin for $12.00 more We took the offer due to the weather Yea! Cabin was cleanand well stocked, complete with porch swing. One downer Bed needs to be replaced unless rolling to the middle is fun for you . Tent sites are close together with little shade Showers and toilets are great A little less than an hour to Carlsbad Caverns. Bring groceries with you, as the campground store has a limited stock of necessities. $38.00 per night for a tent site with no utilities.

This was a really large campground - there was hundreds of campers. It actually looked like an old KOA. We choose it for proximity to Carlsbad Caverns.

Level, gravel lots with picnic tables. There was a decent amount of trees. I only saw one dog area but I think there is more. The dumpsters were located all over in enclosures.

The laundry room was pretty spacious and had some recreational options, but the bathroom, which was fairly new looking, seemed small for the size of the campground. I didn’t see any playground - we did peek into the pool building and it looked kind of sketch.

I appreciated the ease of the late check-in and how we could use showers and laundry at any time by using a key card. I didn’t love the registration system (form email), but in the end, it worked just fine.

I don’t get the sense that there are destination campgrounds in Carlsbad so I think this is a pretty good option.