Valley of Fires Recreation Area

Fee Area. If you need hookups, reserve a site otherwise it’s basically first come first serve. There are showers/flush toilets at main building. Pit toilets in other areas. Water spigots scattered throughout. Dump station.
I dropped in with no reservation on my way to Arkansas. Several dry/improved spots available. I parked in a reservable spot that was open for the day. No hookups but water and pit toilet nearby. Site was clean. Covered picnic table, trash can, grill, fire pit. Check in time 2pm, check out 11am. Overall a very pleasant inexpensive stop.

Wow - this is BLM?!

We didn't know what to expect when we pulled into Valley of Fires Recreation Area. We chose a partial hookup spot because it had a view of the ancient lava fields.

The campground is well kept, except for the showers. Push button, no temperature control, moldy shower curtains and cobwebs in the shower stall.

Other than that, this place is fantastic. We walked the nature trail every morning and the view from our picnic table was pretty glorious.

There is a small market in town, if you're looking for some real supplies, we liked Wild Herb Market in Ruidoso.

A note about cell service. AT&T showed 5 bars, but was only good for calls, not for data. Verizon was fine.

Great cell reception though. Too short of a stay to give the park it's due justice. Snuck right in with no reservations in late October.

The town was interesting. Feel free to explore for yourself but Allsups is the only place with beer. Some craft brews.

Oh and we pulled in at sunset and dang, good job God and/or science. Nice looking sun.

We've had such great luck with New Mexico campgrounds that I feel a little bit like a broken record.

We pulled in at noon on this beautiful March 2, 2016 day and half the sites were available. There are great views to be had from each site.

Impeccably clean bathroom and huge too. I read reviews from a year earlier complaining about the showers. Maybe they read the reviews too! A year later, and they're hot, but not dangerously so they way they are at Oliver Lee Memorial State Park. The shower head was one of the best I've experienced at a park. Good flow, but I don't mind the push button. Makes you more aware of how much you're using which is fine with me. Three shower stalls on the women's side, one handicapped and very roomy. Curtains looked clean to me.

Level, paved sites. Spaced out generously. Lots of wind here on the precipice between desert and lava, so a non-gravel/dirt campground is much appreciated. The tent camping area at the end of the park is in a depression, which is smart. Elsewise they'd just blow away!

We had four bars of Verizon LTE. Pretty great place, super quiet. May stay a few nights!

We went here to join the New Mexico unit of the Airstream Club (WBCCI) for their annual "Glow in the Dark" rally where they visit the site of the first test of the atomic bomb in 1945 (the Trinity Site) which the US Army opens up two times per year. Otherwise we would never have found this delightful off-the-beaten-path campground.

The campground has about 15 sites with water & electric hookups and another four dry RV sites and another half dozen or so tent sites several of which could accommodate a Class B camper. There are plenty of water spigots around the campground for folks in the dry sites. There is a dump station on site.

We had very good TV reception and excellent Verizon data coverage (we were able to stream HI Def video.)

This is a first come first serve campground but there is a lot of daily turnover (many people appear to use this as an overnight stopping point on their way to someplace else) so except for busy holiday weekends you should be able to get a spot immediately or certainly the morning following your arrival. At the time we were here, the campground hosts were very helpful in finding "unofficial" overnight spots for late arrivals.

The restroom and shower facilities are among the best and cleanest we've ever seen in a public campground.

All the sites are paved and level. Each site offers a ramada for shade, grill and picnic table. All sites offer great views of the surrounding lava fields and mountains in the distance.

When we first arrived we thought that this campground was "in the middle of nowhere" and that if it weren't for the Airstream rally we would never come here. Were we wrong! There is the wonderful ski/hike/fish resort town of Ruidoso about 30 miles away up in the mountains, the three Salinas Pueblo Missions, Smokey Bear Historic Park, Three Rivers PEtroglyph Site, Fort Stanton itself and the Forst Stanton Recreation Area, Lincoln State Monument, Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, and on and on all within an easy hour or so drive from the campground. We even went so far as to drive to the Very Large Array (VLA made famous in many films including "Contact" starring Jody Foster) which was about 100 miles away (in New Mexico, a 100 miles drive is not considered "long distance!")

We will definitely put this campground in our "regular rotation!"

We loved this place, although the days we were there it was very windy. Campsite #19 was on the other side of the hill and required dry camping, which was fine with us. It was a large, asphalt campsite overlooking the lava flow and had its own very nice covered picnic table and garbage can. Really nice, friendly, helpful folks running and maintaining the park. I would have liked to stay a bit longer, but we had other places to go (City of Rocks, then Carlsbad Caverns. This park is very well maintained and was very clean and neat. We did not personally use the restrooms, but my wife did go in and check the Ladies area out and said it was clean. We used Valley of Fires as a base camp, then drove south to experience the Three Rivers Petroglyphs (neat!). We had dinner one evening in Corrizozo at the place at the main junction in town--I don't remember the name of the place (sorry)--and the Mexican food was pretty good.

I've been here before, and I can only echo the remark of a previous reviewer: "This is BLM?" It's a small-ish area, with campsites running along a ridge overlooking the lava flow which gives the area its name. The sites are mostly level, with asphalt parking pads, a sheltered picnic table, fire rings, barbecue grills, and individual trash cans. Many of the sites have both electricity and water. There are tent sites in their own area, with water and toilet facilities nearby.

The rest room/shower facilities are wonderfully clean; there are individual shower stalls separated by tiled walls, with wooden changing benches. The (unnecessary, given that each stall has a door) shower curtains are rumpled, but clean. As is usual in this kind of facility, you push a button and water comes out of a nozzle above you. The water stays on for something like 30-45 seconds and turns off automatically; it takes a few cycles of this to get warm/hot water.

There's a path with interpretive signage and some rest benches which wanders down into the lava flow. Well worth the time, and with smooth secure footing all along.

Good ATT and Verizon signals.

The $18 rate includes electric and water; 50% off with various Federal Passes.

Great sunsets.

Easy to find from the highway heading east out of Carrizozo.

What's not to like?

An unexpected gem.
The sites had just been re-paved, and site 1 was level. We checked a few other sites that were very unlevel and in a Class C we couldn't level. A trailer or 5th wheel could level easier in those sites.
We had a no service site, which was not an issue for us. The view over the Valley was incredible. It was very windy though.
Daniel, the camp host, talked to us when we were leaving, and he was very pleasant.
Price reflects America the Beautiful discount.
Carrizozo is a quaint town, and fun to drive around.

We just spent two nights here (in early May, 2021) and there are many great things, but we also had two big problems.

Problem one (probably only an issue in 2021). The sites, and in fact most the campground, have been re-blacktopped. It LOOKS great. So shiny and new. But the stuff is still quite tacky, and we ended up tracking tar into our RV and getting it everywhere. I accidentally knelt on the ground to look at something under my rig, and now I have a ruined pair of pants. When we put our leveling blocks down and leveled our rig, when we left, we found we had left giant lego-shaped impressions in the tar. And when it gets even hotter there in June/July...yikes, it's going to be a problem. Hopefully by next year, it will be better. But this is really something to watch for.

Problem 2: They did a great job re-surfacing everything (see above) but most of the sites, despite looking lovely, are very un-level. We had one heck of a time levelling our 30 ft class A. The sites slope front to back AND to the side. A recipe for a real leveling challenge. We walked around the campground and saw lots of very precariously propped-up rigs (our own included). It's a shame they didn't fix some of this before they resurfaced everything.

The campground, otherwise, is great. The spots are generously sized and spread pretty far apart. Each site has water, a metal picnic table with a substantial shade covering, a fire pit and a grill. Most have 50 amp electric, which worked very cleanly. Water pressure was acceptable.

Most of the sites also have great views of the lava field. The field itself has a 2/3rd mile loop trail with lots of interesting information. We actually walked it 3 different times, first in the evening (and we really enjoyed when the bats came shortly before sunset) and discovered new things each time. There are other, longer trails around, but when we were there the visitor center/gift shop were still closed for COVID and we had no one we could get good information from. We stumbled across a couple of trailheads, but were reluctant to go too far, not knowing what we were in for.

The grounds also include some outstanding tent camping sites, if that's of interest. The dump station is easy to get to. There are also several new looking restrooms, but when we were there, all were closed (again, due to COVID). That was fine with us, but if you're needing restroom facilities available, maybe call ahead.

It's a lovely place and we look forward to returning. (Oh, and cell phone coverage was excellent. We used our Verizon Hot Spot for watching Netflix with no issues.)

$6.00 was for a site without electricity, just water, and also half price for America the beautiful pass (senior).
If it is windy out it is WINDY, you are in the wide open space and no protection, but was still a very nice place to stay. And as the review before me said about the bathrooms, the bathrooms ARE OPEN the showers ARE NOT. The bathrooms are exceptionally clean.