Big Bend of the Colorado State Recreation Area

We stayed here at the end of February 2021 for one night, and although the park is beautiful, clean and pretty new, all Nevada Parks are FCFS, so you have to arrive early! We arrived about 4 pm and were able to get one of the few primitive sites left (no hookup). Our site had a nice concrete bench, picnic table and fire ring.
We also used the well-maintained free dump station which has potable water on the way out. The main sites are huge and all have full hookups. Would love to stay again if we can arrive earlier in the day.

We pulled in on New Years Eve. Stayed at a rv site with no utilities. We were prepared to boondock so not having power/water/sewer was not an issue. Unfortunately, it was pretty windy so we didn’t get to go on any hikes or enjoy being outdoors, but we’d stay again. Close to Laughlin/Mohave valley/bullhead city. Pictures of day use area taken the day we left. Great cell signal. Dump. Potable water. Not busy during this trip.

01/06/21 Update: we ended up staying the week. Cell service was good and we weren’t ready to head back home or drive too much. We moved to a hookup site and worked remotely for the week with no issues and beautiful views.

Though we prefer to boondock, We will be back.

This is a great little Campground with full hookups close to the Colorado River, Laughlin Nevada, and Bullhead City Arizona. The campground is well kept up and frequently patrolled by the state rangers.

It's a first-come-first-serve campground.

The sites are very large and well spaced

The beach at the river portion of the campground is very nice and a great place to launch a boat, fish, take a swim or have a picnic.

We stayed here from March 8-16 2020. Originally we had planned to only stay a couple nights, but this is when COVID was becoming an obvious issue, so we opted out of visiting two other Nevada State Parks and just stayed here for the duration. All Nevada State Parks are first come, first served, and when we arrived, the campground was full. The ranger in the booth said that a few people should be leaving, however, so we parked in the day use area and waited for someone to leave. Someone did in fact leave, so we ended up in site 10. All of the sites here are HUGE -- like maybe the biggest we've ever seen. The full hookups is what drew us in, the peace and quiet is was kept us here. Each site is a pull-through with a fire pit, picnic table, and shade structure. The restrooms/showers are all individual, which is great for privacy and safety, but they're very basic concrete block. There was a fire here in August 2019 that was still very obvious, as all of the vegetation that would have given the area some color and privacy between sites was gone. Don't get me wrong -- the sites are very well spaced out and noise wasn't an issue, but the landscape felt a little barren. While being right on the Colorado River, none of the sites actually have views of the river, which is a short walk away. The city of Laughlin doesn't offer much but a handful of casinos, some gas stations, a post office, a very sad mall, and an In N Out. For anything else (grocery stores, laundromat, Walmart), you'll have to cross the river into Bullhead City, AZ. The Colorado River is very beautiful here and seems to be a destination during the warmer months, but the whole area was pretty quiet during our stay.

I can see why many like this place. It’s cheap, has full hookups, and most sites are pull through, large, and spaced far away from other campsites. But our experience was negative. For starters, there was a recent fire that destroyed a lot of the bushes and trees. Thus there was very limited shade from the hot sun. Second, fire ants everywhere!!! Third, the first site they tried to give us had broken electricity and we noticed a few other sites were broken too. In the middle of the night our campsite electric started flashing and we worried there were serious electrical problems. So we unplugged. Fourth, the “pristine” river waters that the state park website boasted were littered with trash. It wasn’t the fun end of Summer beach experience we expected. It was a fire ant infested, littered, scorched electrical hazard. So we left even though we’d planned to stay a few nights. If you’re just passing through I’m sure it’s a great stop. But we thought it was a worthy destination and we were seriously disappointed. BTW, the ADA campsites are concrete pads located near the restrooms, but the rest of the campsites are gravel. Fees vary a little: if you have Nevada State Park all access pass then camping is free without hookups and $10/night with hookups. There's also a nice dump/fill station at the front of the campground that looks like it can be used by campers as well as day user, but I did not test or ask questions so I can't be certain.

Knowing this was a first-come, first-served campground I made arrangements to arrive early. The posted sign at the entry office window said "campground full". But just as I was about to pay the $10 daily use fee which was posted as required to "look around", one of the office staff told me to hold off while she checked to see if anything might open up. Sure enough, within an hour or so another camp staff member came over to say a site had opened up. I paid $60, $30 per night ($20 camping and $10 for hookups) - you have to pay for camping AND hook-ups, so they should just say it is $30/night. The sites are amazing - HUGE, level, and modern. Wonderful shelter with a picnic table and a very nice central bath/shower area. The road is paved and sites are gravel. but big enough to fit a semi. The only issue is that the area has undergone a controlled burn and appears to be expanding as there is construction going on in the adjacent land. It was way too windy to spend much time outside other than walking the dog so that was hardly an issue. The views are terrific and the layout provides lots of open space between sites. Great cell reception with access to casinos and the Colorado River area at Laughlin and Bullhead City.

The price reflects staying 14 days, buying a $200 Nevada State Park pass, which then lets you stay free + $10 for hookups! Normally it's $30/d. We can now stay again and only pay $10/d at this or some other Nevada State Parks. It's a deal!

There is no pre-booking, so there is always the chance of not getting a spot, but there are so many RV places in the area we figured that we could have found a backup plan easily. The nearest is the KOA at the Avi Casino to the south, there is also a dry camping option at the casino that looks free or cheap.

The spaces are large and easy to get into. Full hookups with 50A. Fire pit, BBQ and large cover over the concrete bench. The Colorado River is walking distance away, or you can be lazy and just drive the car down to the day use parking lots. The beach is pretty good and there are also covered benches there too.

Location is quiet. A Roadrunner visits each day and a small flock of Quail passes by some days.

There are stores a few miles south by crossing into Arizona. To the north, there's a USPS that accepts General Delivery as you hit the outskirts of Laughlin. There is a cinema and plenty of other entertainment options in downtown Laughlin because of the Casinos.

Hiking, offroad ATV, jetskis on the river, fishing, etc. So lots of options for activities.

Loved this place and will definitely be coming back.

Update: We returned in February. Although there was a very good Verizon signal the bandwidth at 6 am was 30+mbps, but once the traffic increased it was falling to 1-2 Mbps throughout the day. Too slow for me. T-Mobile was better at 3-5 Mbps. Sprint was awesome at 30-70 Mbps.

If you purchased the Nevada State pass try and check out Valley of Fire State Park. Stunning and $10 with hookups is a steal.

On our way home from Tucson to Boise we decided to quickly make this stop in order to go see the Burros in Oatman. We searched for places to stay all over the area and settled on this State Park. We were completely surprised by this great little park! As we drove through Laughlin and saw all the Casino RV parks (not our thing) we quickly began to worry that this might not be our thing.

We were so wrong! This State Park has none of what you see in the heart of Laughlin or even the casino RV parks further south. Each site was quite large and the placement of each made for really good privacy. The bathrooms were clean and had showers. If you choose not to hook up you only pay $10 a night instead of the $30 we paid. But at 100+ degrees were chose Air Conditioning!!!

The big rock mountains on the west side of the park were quite beautiful. This is in the Mohave Desert climate so you have to appreciate desert flora and fauna, which we do. We took a nice walk to the river at night on a dirt access road to the south of the sites. It was really nice and the river is so nice.

If you go straight upon entering the park (instead of turning into the campground) you come to a beach on the river with many covered picnic tables and a small boat ramp. We spent an afternoon on the beach and really enjoyed it. I wish I had my paddle board but this was an unplanned side trip. There were only a few other people there and it was just “low key.”

We will definitely return to this campground!

This is a nice campground and it was never very crowded while we were there. The sites are HUGE and are full hookup. The showers were clean enough but...you also had to pay, or get tokens or some such thing. Showers and restrooms were individual though, that's a plus.
There is a picnic area and boat launch, both close fairly early and are separate from the campground. The campground is immediately to the right of the entrance station, we missed that and toured the picnic area as a result.
The road in the campground is completely navigable but a bit narrow and curvy so big rigs, be forewarned.
It's a good base camp for day trips around the area.
The price we paid reflects the $10 daily fee assessed for full hookup use and in conjunction with the annual Nevada State Park pass at $200. Otherwise the sites would have been $20 without hookups, $30 with hookups.