Bonita Canyon Campground

Bonita Canyon campground was built during the 1930's by Civilian Conservation Corps workers that were paid $1.00 a day plus room and board. It was designed in an era when Model T's were still popular and campers used WWI surplus army tents. Most of the sites are small, very small. And they have only grown smaller as cars, RV's, trailers and tents have grown bigger. Sometime around the turn of the 21st century plastic slat rail fencing was installed in the Bonita Canyon campground. The fencing partitions off areas in every site that are no longer available for camping. Tree islands lie within and the ground is covered with fallen branches, weeds and brush. On average each campsite lost about 40% of the pre-fence space it had. Large boulders were placed about 25 feet from the paved loop road to terminate each driveway and thus regulate how far a vehicle could back in. RV's and trailers either do not fit or must be shoehorned in. Almost every tree along the driveways is gouged from some vehicle it damaged. Cars, trucks and tow vehicles often are forced to park along the edge of the narrow and twisting, one way loop road. Most of the sites are communal; the fence leaves wide openings between sites that you can walk through. My site had a wide walkway to two adjoining sites. The average distance from one driveway to the next is 30 feet. So your neighbor is just 15 feet away and within earshot. After the sun sets, the sites are very dark and by 10 PM, very quiet. That is when the bears come out so bring a flashlight. Communal water spigots are placed about every 300 feet along the road. No water or electric power is available for individual sites. The water tasted fine but had a tea color to it. The campground restroom also dates from the 1930's. The men's room is tiny; 9 feet by 9 feet square. Two toilets and a filthy sink were crammed into that space. An overhead heater blasted for a week non-stop even though temperatures were in the 70's outside. Waist high windows in the restrooms afford a panoramic view of the campground, and vice versa. The Ladies room I am told, offers a similar experience. The one way loop road has a stream running across it in two spots. Instead of funneling the stream through a culvert under the road, a 4 foot deep channel was cut through the road and lined with concrete. Gashes on the steep concrete slopes confirm that more than a few trailers have deeply dug their rear bumpers into the road surface. Many live oaks and other trees that do not drop their foliage completely, dot the campground. While pleasing to look at they reduced my solar charging capacity by 80%. They also produced lots of pollen in spring and made breathing difficult. An unmanned Ranger's vehicle was permanently parked on the side of the road by the Visitor Center. It had a dummy radar gun on the dash and appeared to be a way of deceiving visitors into thinking they entered a speed trap. WiFi is available at the Visitor Center and is free. The store inside is tiny and sold mostly overpriced books. Ice, propane, gasoline, groceries, laundry and other supplies were only available at Willcox, a 70 mile round trip drive. Cell service is non-existent at the campground and on most trails.There are no showers in the park. Thus most campers, thankfully, only stayed a few days. The trails are wonderful and offer spectacular beauty. In April they were well used and I met about 40 people hiking on an average day. Horses share the trails and sometimes their waste was difficult to side step. "Leave No Trace" does not apply to them!

Stayed 1 nite on 1 /19/21. $10 with Senior National Parks pass. Make sure you reserve a spot ahead of arriving as not many were available. Dry camping. Wooded and secluded small campground, which makes it so special. Sites are small and tight but perfect for our 22' Sprinter. Pay attention to the 24' RV length limits because the campground road is tree lined and has several good size dips in it. AT&T Cell service two bars with booster for texting but no phone calls. Chiricahua National Monument is a special place to see. From the small size of all the parking areas it must not get many visitors, which makes it perfect for peaceful scenic views as well as great hiking. We will definitely be back for another visit to explore all this awesome place has to offer.

The 30-foot Cruise America left its mark on the campground: two large gouges in the paved wash, colored with its white bumper paint. The campground is serious about the 24-foot RV limit - that being a 24-foot motorhome or a 24-foot trailer, not including tow vehicle. Many good reasons, including tight turns, low branches and two unavoidable deep washes. The campground is beautiful. A handful of sites have views of the rocks. The road noise is heard all over; however, the road's speed limit of 25 MPH keeps noise to a minimum. The "dump station" is not a traditional dump station. The gray waste-only dump is an elevated sink for kitchen water and food bits. There are two of them; both many feet from pavement. No fresh water fill. We used the dump services at Lifestyle RV Resort in Willcox. They do propane swaps too. Be sure to look at the pad/campsite length and study the Reserve America and CampsitePhotos.com photos. Some sites are double-wides; some are sedan width. When we were leaving, we had to drive up onto wood and leveling pads so that we would not drag out the tongue jack and rear stabilizing jacks/bumper. ALWAYS LOOK OUT FOR TREES! Every...single...tree has a gash from an RV. No RV parking at Massai Point. The most you could fit in the parking lot would be a Sprinter van. Driving anything larger than that up the road would be a danger to yourself and others. Verizon cell service is one bar, text only with cellular data off and using a cell phone signal booster attached to a ten foot pole that is zip-tied to the camper's ladder. Campendium gives the option of one bar voice only, but there is definitely no voice phone calls at camp. I did make a phone call at Massai Point. Watch for sandhill cranes flying by from November to January. On the 186, just north of the turn to the park on the 181, there are some REALLY BAD whoops in the road (pictured). Thankfully, we hit them when we were not towing and later on, we were prepared to slow down when we hit the whoops while towing. A bullet point from the reservation email: “Maximum RV/motorhome or trailer length in the campground and on the Bonita Canyon Drive past the visitor center is 29 feet, actual measurements.” Note that there are MANY signs that say 24 feet and the dips in the campground will take out a 29 foot camper. Under campground notices, the reservation email states: “Tight angles, difficult to back into site.”

This is probably one of my top favorite camping sites. It was pitch black at night and not a sound to be heard. I got such great sleep here. The campsite area is small and right - site 11 fit our 25 ft Airstream perfectly but anything bigger through the curves will be hard and difficult. NO cell reception miles from the park so it was really nice to truly unplug. No showers at the campgrounds. We saw deer a few times and the hike around the monument is unbelievable and breathtaking.

This park is a gem, and it is worth it to stay there, as there aren't many good camping options nearby. Rigs larger than 24 feet are not allowed past the visitors center, so the campground and scenic drive would be out. Even the visitor center doesn't have RV spaces, so I'm not sure where a bigger vehicle would even go to turn around. No hook-ups. There are flush toilets and cold water sinks. There is also potable water, however, we noticed after drinking some that it was yellowish and oily looking, and sure enough we got sick. The next day is was clearer, we saw it being tested the night we were there and they must have adjusted the chlorine. We were in site 18 and really enjoyed the size and foliage. We had a neighbor right across from us, but not close on the sides. The group camp site would have been, but we got lucky and it was closed due to Covid. Some sites are close together, and I've read reviews on other sites of people complaining about noisy neighbors. We did notice just down the way a truck camper that partied late into the night and had bright LED lights on their rig that they left on all night. I felt bad for their neighbor that was super close to them. Campground was listed as full both nights we were there, but there were a lot of no-shows, particularly on the 2nd night when it was going to get into the 30s/40s.

We are Arizona natives from Phoenix. We took a week to explore southern AZ. This campground in the Chiricahua monument is a real hidden gem. Small so I’m sure it is full all summer. No power so the generator was necessary. The closest store is in Pearce so bring everything. It was in the 30s a night 50s during the day. The hikes are great. Lots of birds and animals. No ground fires was a bummer for us.

Beautiful campground with open spots. We didn’t have reservations and with America the Beautiful pass would have only been $10 a nite. But internet only works by office. Park rangers were terrific and was well worth drive. Can’t bring large rig and even our smaller 25 footer had difficulty turning around. Also be careful driving there as there are roads with fairly deep water and there is some ice and snow on mountain so get there early in day. Also there is shuttle available to assist with hiking which is great.

High rating because - This place looked awesome for a campground and we really wanted to stay there, but it didn't work out for us. Reality - We ran drove through the first 5-6 sites before the drop off into the creek which our 24' bumper pull made it without scraping anything. We ran into the camp host at that point and he asked if we had a reservation, which we didn't, and he said given our length site 4 (which I already scoped out and I don't think our slide would have cleared) and site 12. We went to 12 and it would have worked great but the slope of the site was so big we would have needed way more blocking and our jack would have ran out of stroke to level out. Lastly, we went out to take a look at 4 again and had to go through another creek crossing and out trailer scraped pretty bad going up it so we decided we better not push our luck. It is too bad because it looked like it would be a great spot. No hookups or dump site, but that was fine with us.