Hackamore Road Dispersed Camping

Road is very rutted, watch for Cholla cacti and it is great place to boondock.
Lots of traffic surprisingly!

Good proximity to town, good views of Superstition Mountains. Camping areas are spread out, but only the ones right off the road are accessible to large rigs. Only single vehicles or single axle trailers should venture far off the road. The main road itself is very wide but also very rutted. Class A busses probably wouldn't make it.
There is an OHV vehicle staging area at the end of the road, so there is constant jeep, truck, dirtbike, atv, utv, etc traffic.

Several campers were definitely not obeying 14 day limits and appeared to be living in this location.

The views here are spectacular. The road in is very rutted and bumpy. Low clearance beware. We have a class b van and did ok with deft maneuvering. This is a local hangout for those up to no good as we found out when in the night, off-road vehicles ran the roads up and down all hours of the night, often careening through at high speeds. Just when we finally fell asleep, the local sheriff paid a visit, and we had to provide license and info. Apparently, there have been “issues” of late. They will be here patrolling overnight for a few weeks to clean things up as complaints have mounted. Safer, but Be prepared to be awoken. They did say they were taking down names and plates so it wouldn’t happen twice. They were nice, but obvs gave us a scare given the time of night. Disappointing because the spot is a rare gem and quiet when the speedway isn’t in full swing and in between other noises... The morning was also loud with construction trucks nearby. If you use your a/c great, windows open, you’ll be eating dust with the traffic! Cell signal is great, which is rare for boondocking. FYI No facilities. Nearest Gas 3.5 miles away. (Not sure to rate noise 1 for bad/noisy or 5 for loud?) TMO signal 2-3 bars depending on where you camp.

Bumpy road on the way in. It rained so the area was very muddy. Clearly this area is used by people staying more than the 14 day limit. Lots of cars also coming and going. One thing very frustrating was the number of trucks and recreation vehicles speeding through the roads at all hours of the day and night. It seemed vehicles would make the same loop over and over again. The views are spectacular, it’s too bad this area is being abused.

The road has several large holes and dips along the trail, when we arrived and parked I saw large pieces of broken tiles (possibly roof tiles?) scattered around the campsite and other trash to include a large metal awning.

It appeared that our neighbors were living there more than camping there.

Riding our quad in Bulldog Canyon (Tonto pass required $6 for 6 months per operator) was great, however we were almost run over a few times by side by sides; the hills and bowl area were fun.

Exploring behind the main road also had several areas that had a large amount of trash left behind and people possibly living in their vehicles or tents.

It was also noted that there were several nails and other broken glass scattered around the areas here.

The noise was there but it wasn’t too bad for us and didn’t go later than 10:30 pm or so and didn’t seem to be before 8:00 am.

The view was great- the neighbors didn’t seem to bother us much (other than to borrow some fuel), however the danger of quad riding on the trails with larger side by sides running up on us from blind corners and the possibility of puncturing our tires is a great deterrent to camp out here again.

This is my first review on this website and unfortunately it is going to be an extremely negative one because it was an extremely negative experience. And during Christmas of all times!! We needed to be close to Mesa to see family so this was one of our only free options but I would gladly pay $30 a night to never have to go thru this trauma ever again!!

First of all, I want to say that the views were PHENOMENAL!! The Superstition Mountains are in full display here and it is an amazing sight to see!!

Sadly, the rest of this camping area is absolutely horrible! Within the first 5 minutes, my dog got into some human waste which was on display right under a bush right off the road. Gross, I know!! Dogs will be dogs! Well, later that evening, I realized that my poor dog was totally STONED (and not in a good, mellow kind of way!!). She was twitching and freaking out to the point that I called an emergency vet and almost took her in!!

The road is absolutely horrendous getting in and the camp sites if that's what you want to call them are huge mud holes for local ATVs and pickup trucks!! To make matters even worse (which I wasn't sure was even possible!!), the area got over an inch of rain which brought every local mud truck out who proceeded to just churn it all into a royal mess! There were already huge pot holes and ruts in the road which were now filled with water and turned into mush!! I was so nervous that we would get stuck with our travel trailer trying to get out of there but we received a day after Christmas miracle and we were able to escape unscathed!!

I'm really not a drama queen but the stay that we had on Hackamore Road was by far our worst camping experience to date!

If you are into mud and rough, rutted roads, you will be in pig heaven here!! If you want a quiet, relaxed camping experience soaking in the views of the Superstitions, this is NOT your place!

This is my second time here. Unbelievable unobstructed views of Lost Dutchman. The road into this huge maze is extremely rutted with massive pits and you will have to take a perfect line in once you pass the fenced building on your left. Do not attempt at night! Once you get in there are many roads that aren’t as terrible that snake around all over the place. I have a very low clearance van, if I can make it then I almost guarantee you can. Quite a few people living in mini vans but I was not bothered. 200mb download/ 8mb upload on T Mobile 5G. Some trash and generator noise but lots of room between sites. I actually like this spot once I manage to find a spot. It’s worth a shot unless you have very low clearance or a big rig.

Aside from the views of the Superstition Mountains, this is a terrible spot. Hackamore Rd is not maintained and is basically a dirt bike track. The jeeps and dirt bikes rev their engines at all hours of the night. There is some sort of mine on the other side of the road; they start work well before sunrise at 5am. So by the time the OHVs stop, you have a few hours to sleep before the constant beeping if trucks. The mine also blasts the ground with dynamite without warning, which is terrifying if you don't know it's about to happen.

Looked like a really run down trailer park I thought people were only supposed to be there for 14 days not 14 year’s

As others have said alot of people full time living here. Lots of trash and the road are very tore up.