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Best App To Find Free Camping

5 min read

Some dispersed campsites do have established tent pads or fire rings, but not most. If you’ve come upon one of these sites, congratulations! You just discovered the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.

They can be located in unpleasant industrial areas, in locations with amazing views, or nearby to important attractions. The best way to find out about them is “park4night” (android / iOS), possibly the biggest and most popular camping app in Europe. The app does not only lead you to the parking spot but also tells you what amenities they offer and provides detailed ratings from other users. A paper road atlas can be super handy when road tripping or doing van life and looking for free camping.

The more remote an area, the better your odds are that it allows camping. You may also find that multiple organizations within the same county have their own park systems which means even more varying rules and fee schedules. Finally, ranger stations can be a great resource for information. If you are unsure about where you are allowed to camp, swing into the local ranger station for maps and advice. Before we move on, I want to quickly talk about other types of free places to park overnight. Stop by the rangers office when you arrive at your destination.

Reserve America Ra Camping

For BLM lands, you begin looking in a specific state and then see that the districts are broken up geographically and select the district you are interested in. Forestry Service land is similar to BLM land, but often you will see contiguous districts within the same forest. The name of an area may change when it crosses a state border, but often the BLM or USFS area may be administered by the same district. IOverlander is a FREE app that you download to your phone. Users can upload photos, a description, and other information, like internet availability, along with GPS coordinates.

The app allows you to filter by the length of your RV, amenities offered, and even allows you to book your stay directly on the app. You can also purchase your tickets to federal parks and recreation areas as well as sign up for lotteries to areas that require a permit. Part of the ease of traveling these days is the multitude of camping and/or boondocking apps that you have available to you right at your fingertips. Some of them can be tricky to use if you don’t have cell signal but there are others that work even off-grid.

✔Primitive hike-in/boat-in/rough road spots that other apps exclude. What’s a road trip without road trip songs – and Spotify is our fave to play them. The best music app IOHO and still compatible with the old-school ipod touch, this one never lets us down. Trip Advisor is helpful when looking for reviews on restaurants and attractions.

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You can also download offline maps and campsites so they’re ready for you when you head out of cell phone service. Campendium is a very popular app with RVers, although the app only works on iOS devices you can still access the website with an Android device. The apps database of campgrounds is quite large and features some great filtering options.

We find that using Delorme road atlases is a great way to find boondocking spots, and they’re great to have when there’s no cell coverage. A great feature of Free Roam is the ability to plan your trip. Although this feature is a little tricky to use, once you get the hang of it you can set how far you want to travel in a day and visualize the boondocking options on the map. The pro version of Allstays is available for an annual fee of around $35.

Electronics Apps

Some other features include a TPS Shuttle finder and some other neat stuff. ParKing is another simple, but usually effective parking app. It offers a simple UI, a one-tap save for your parking location, and it can automatically detect your parking spot as well. The automatic detecting is a bit buggy and worked half of the time in our testing.

These boondocking options are most frequently used by RV campers and “vanlifers” who are frequently traveling long distances and simply looking for a place to park and sleep. Check-in with businesses ahead of time, or go in and talk to the manager to make sure you’re following the rules. Dispersed camping often happens at the end, or alongside, bumpy, pothole-ridden roads that don’t see a lot of traffic. If you’re heading to a secluded piece of land in the woods, check the area’s department website. Stay limits, access, amenities, permitting requirements, and the types of camping that are allowed at these sites vary greatly.

The website is fairly basic, but setting that aside, it is an excellent resource to use before you hit the road or when you are in an area with good cell service or WiFi. This post will cover some of the absolute best in camping apps and websites. Green icons are free, red ones are pay ($12 or less), and the blue ones require a permit. The permits are not free, but they’re cheap and cover multiple days. When you click/touch the icon, a box will popup in the map with a summary of the campsite.

The Dyrt is the all-in-one resource for campers to find campsites, read reviews, and book their stay. With the most campground photos, videos, and reviews of any camping resource, The Dyrt offers comprehensive and user-submitted guides to camping across the U.S. Our desktop, iOS, and Android apps feature over 42,000 ranked campgrounds with more being added every day. Users can compete in camping contests, where online reviews can lead to real prizes and discounts with our outdoor brand partners. If you’re into boondocking — or camping for free at nontraditional campsites — FreeRoam is the app you need. This app is a boondocker’s dream, offering information on overnight camping spots, dumpsites, fresh water, groceries, propane, gyms, showers, cell towers, and other necessities.

You can even search by the type of access road to the sites. When you select a site, you’ll be given the GPS coordinates, elevation and the local weather so you can pack accordingly. All Stays Camp & Rvis a $9.99 app that you download to your phone.

Searchforsites is billed as ‘the easy way to find campsites and motorhome stopovers across Europe’. There is an app but search for sites themselves suggest using the website for a better experience. You’ll just find those public park listings alongside boutique destinations, private treehouses, or hillside yurts — all of which can be requested and booked through the app.

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