Best Tent Camping near Arches National Park

Amazing views of red rock cliffs along the Colorado river

Goose Island Campground is an amazing campground to get for a visit to Arches National Park. Located only 1.5 miles from Moab and 4.5 miles from Arches National Park's visitor, so close you can walk or bike to town. This campground is right on the Colorado River with towering red rock wall on the Arches National Park side of the river. The scenery is just amazing. This campground is on my all time favorite list. This is a first come first served campground and is very popular, I have been here twice once in July and once in October and both times were lucky to get a spot. Sites are nice and level with plenty of room to spread out and nicely spread apart. The campground has 18 sites and 2 group sites which can be reserved. Cost for individual sites are$20. The campground has three vault toilets, water and trash service. Each campsite has a picnic table and a metal fire ring.

Dead Horse Point has a new section called Wingate. The older section is Kayenta.

Wingate has wide asphalt spaces, electricity, fire rings, tent pads and picnic tables with wind blocks on 2 sides. There are very few trees...so no shade. (Kayenta has greater shade possibilities.) There may also be some sewer hookups.

Another feature - walk-in tent sites and yurts. There are 4 great looking yurts in Wingate and 5 others near the park's Visitor Center.

Bathrooms - they are private and include an automatic flush toilet, soap dispenser, automatic faucet and hand dryer. No showers but the bathrooms are very nice.

There is a dishwashing sink outside the bathroom. It appears the water is potable but they ask you to arrive with water and help conserve water. Their water is trucked in from Moab....per reserveamerica.com.

Staying at this little campground feels like you're on top of the world, which must be why this area of Canyonlands is called Island in the Sky. It made exploring this area of Canyonlands easy, and led to a very peaceful night.

The campground: With only twelve campsites, this campground has a slower and more intimate vibe. While it's not the highest elevation I have camped at, there's a feeling of being really high up, and because the trees in the campground are low shrub-y things, it also feels very wide open. (But still enough privacy to not see the campers on the other side of the loop.) Unless you stay here around a full moon, the stars are incredible.

My campsite had a parking spot I could pull in; the spot for the tent was dirt. It also included a small pavilion that provided a little shade for the picnic table below, and a fire ring with a grate. There was a vault toilet across the road from my site. There's no drinking water at this campground.

The area: There are multiple districts in Canyonlands National Park, and you have to go different ways to get to each of them. This area is called Island in the Sky; it has several hikes to scenic overlooks of the canyons. It's a bit of a drive to get to Island in the Sky if you're coming from Arches National Park, and I would recommend having all your supplies ahead of time; especially water.

Booking: First-come; first-served. I stayed here in November, arrived in the afternoon, and there were only three campsites open.

Cell service: None. Don't expect to have cell service in any part of this district of Canyonlands. I had some at the Visitor's Center right at the entrance to the Park.

General & Site Quality: 56 electric sites, walk-in tent sites, and nine yurts in two loops: Kayenta and Wingate. Paved driveways, mostly level, a tent pad, fire ring, and a sheltered picnic table (from sun and wind) complete the electric sites. Back-in sites are on the inside of the loops while pull-thru sites are on the outside. There were three camp hosts in the Wingate loop, more than I usually see. 

Bathhouse: Eight individual units in each loop with toilet, sink, soap, and hand dryer. Although the toilets were automatic flush, they didn’t always do the job and often took multiple tries. One toilet was clogged. There are also some vault toilets. No showers. 

Activities: Nice and easy hiking trails. You can hike the west rim and east rim trails to make a loop for approximately five miles (depending on how many overlooks you include). Some trails are better marked than others, but we enjoyed a west-to-east rim hike from and returning to our campsite in Wingate. Designated mountain biking trails. 

Unfortunately, we could only snag one night here but would have liked to have stayed longer.