Brown Springs Campground

Leaving Moab, heading down to Albuquerque, wanted a quick boondocking spot. Called the Farmington BLM field office at 505.564.7600 and learned about Brown Springs Campground. A permit is required and was email to us. We were then required to print it out, fill it out, and email it back to the BLM field office, and later received confirmation that we were good to go. I don't know the stay limit as we only needed it for one night, but I imagine that you might be able to stay for 14 days but ask to be sure.

The coordinates are for the staging area just off of Pinon Hills Blvd. The actual campground is about 3 miles down a washboard, dirt road. (It's a little rough, drive accordingly.) Your GPS may say to turn left at the fork right before the campground, but you actually need to bear to the right.

This campground was so NEW, that there hadn't even been any fires in the fire-rings. All sites are pretty level gravel pads, with a picnic table and a fire-ring, some with nice decorative block retaining walls and split rail fencing. Most sites even have a BBQ grill. There is one concrete pad, right next to the ADA accessible pit toilet with a concrete sidewalk from the pad to the toilet. Strangely, this handicapped site didn't have a fire ring. Don't know what's up with that, other than the entire campsite was concrete. (Though all of the other fire rings were on a concrete circle and not directly on the ground)

In addition to a great campground, there are miles and miles of 4 x 4 trails, as well as several dirt bike trails.

To get the correct website address for the field office, just google, "Farmington, NM BLM field office" To get the address and directions to the campground google "Brown springs campground, Farmington, NM"

This is a brand new campground. They spent two years building this amazing place. There is are fire pits, grills, picnic tables, two bathrooms, and an overhang at each campsite. It is a small campground with ten sites. During the weekends, there are a lot of ATV vehicles traveling the trails but few come around the campground. One needs to get a permit by calling 505-564-7676 which is quite easy and again it is free. One can stay for fourteen days. Internet is strong and the campground is clean and well cared. This is the best BLM campground that I have visited so far and I spent a good amount of time in dispersed land. The three-mile drive into the campground is a bit rough but go slow no issues

What a great little BLM campground! Its brand new and very clean. There are 10 sites here a few will fit larger rigs. We stayed in site #9 in our 38ft 5er and had room to spare. A larger rig would fit here. The road in is pretty decent a little washboard but not bad, just go slow. There are vault toilets, gazebos with picnic tables and fire rings and grills to use. It's not far from here to shopping to restock, about 7 miles driving to a Walmart super center and restaurants. All in all a great place! Would definitely stay here again.
A permit is required but is free. Just stop in at the BLM office a few miles up the road for your permit.

We really enjoyed our stay here! This campground was brand new when we arrived in late June, some sites hadn’t even been camped in yet...but I imagine it won’t be kept a secret for long and will fill up quickly on the weekends (only 10 campsites) Bring your side by side, Jeep, or just your hiking shoes, there are great rock crawling trails all around that can keep you busy for several days. Strictly dry camping with few amenities (pretty much just outhouses, charcoal grills at each site, and a horse shoe pit) Can fit oversized rigs in a few of the sites. There is even one large site for handicap campers that’s completely paved. All sights are good size though. Our toy hauler is 36 feet and could have fit in almost all the sights (having to unload toys from the garage first before backing in) we had a great few days!

This place is a little score! We pulled in on a Saturday night en route from Salt Lake City to Cloudcroft, NM, looking for a better in-transit alternative than the Farmington Wally World. This is a brand-new campground opened by the BLM in 2019. 10 gravel sites include covered pavilion, grill, fire ring and a concrete patio. Our site #5 even had a little fenced yard of sorts with a beautiful retaining wall. Site sizes are generous, and spacing between sites is exceptional. The BLM designers even put a gorgeous piece of twisted juniper within our "yard", and laid large round river rock beneath the split rail fence.

On this Saturday in mid-September the campground only had a few other occupants, so we had our choice of sites even on a Saturday night. Although the surrounding area is popular with OHVs we didn't have any come through the campground itself, and never had a problem with OHV noise. Realize that this is dry camping, and pack in/pack out.

As others have said, the three-mile dirt road getting in is a bit washboarded, but it's wide, flat and straight, negotiable by any size rig. Most sites are large enough for big rigs, and wide enough to park a tow vehicle next to a trailer, or a toad next to a motorhome. All of the shopping amenities of Farmington are just a few minutes away.

If we didn't have to get back on the road, we would have definitely stayed longer. You can't ask for better for free.

Stayed here 14 days. Will need permit. BLM office close to camp. Shopping in Farmington. Free Rv dump,
water and air at Sinclair Station in Farmington. Propane refilling at Sinclair. Some ORV noise, didn’t bother me.
Road in is wide, a bit rough but not an issue. I have seen class A’s here. There is a concrete handicap site. I get 2bars Verizon, text and talk good. Upload and download sketchy.

Would stay again!

Great place to just relax, if you don’t come prepared to stay every store you would need is in town close by.
If you can climb around on the big rocks and cliffs there. I am starting to see a trend in these places however, trash on the ground dirty diapers in the fire pit and the grills with old food and garbage, come on guys these are nice places i visit and its free i can see some of these places going to start charging and hire someone to clean up regularly, i pick up trash every where i go out of the respect of FREE and then make sure when i pull out i stop and rewalk the area to check behind myself, FREE.

You need a free permit from the BLM field office: 6251 College Blvd, Farmington, NM. They close at 4pm, and from Noon to 1pm. Cgrd is NW of the BLM - Go W on Piñon Hills Blvd, then N on Glade Rd about 3m, on the L with a sign. Good dirt road all the way in.

Level, well-spaced gravel pads, roofed cement slabs with table, BBQ and fire ring. Vault toilet steps away. Not that picturesque, but an easy place to stay for a couple weeks of getting to the places nearby which are. A few OHVs around, but otherwise I have the place to myself right now.

Way to go BLM! (BTW, my Google Maps GPS tried to take me a back way from the BLM office and I ended up in a maze of sand washes - use Piñon Blvd to Glade Rd - easy in and out.)

If you like offroading this is a fun place to camp. Beautiful small BLM campground as others mentioned. Large parking pads can accommodate several vehicles or toys. We did unhook our trailer and park it next to the motorhome, but no problem fitting our 38 ft. coach, 16 foot cargo trailer, side by side and motercycle. Our first night, there were two other campers but the last two nights it was just us and one other camper. BLM camping permit can be downloaded, filled out and emailed to the ranger which was good since we pulled in after hours on Halloween. The trail noise was not bad at all and the place quiets down really well by 10 except an occassional weekend group out playing at night on the trails but mid week was nice and quiet.

Clean and new, 2.7-3 miles down Glade Rd. Don’t take the back way, left out of BLM field office, unless you want to go 4wheeling. Lots of OTR trails and washes. Wide spots not as level as they look but nice.