Mancos Main Campground

I stayed at Mancos State Park in order to explore the southwest corner of Colorado. I visited Mesa Verde National Park, the San Juan National Forest, Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, rode the Durango-Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad. It was a great central location for all of these activities.

The campsites at Mancos are primitive, unpaved sites. Each has a picnic bench and fire ring. The bathrooms are pit toilets and there were potable water spigots. There aren't any shower options nearby. The town of Mancos has a few restaurants and gas stations, but if you need additional supplies you'll have to drive to either Cortez or Durango.

I had a gravel pull through site that was large and level, with partial shade cover. There was enough sunlight to keep my power station charged. As I was there over the July 4th weekend, there were quite a few large groups. Some were noisy and ran loud generators, but thankfully everyone quieted down by 11 pm. Because it's far from the main highway, the nights are quiet and you'll have a nice view of the stars.

One of the drawbacks of Colorado State Parks is that even with a camping reservation, they require a $9 day use fee for each day of your stay. Take this into account when booking - it may be cheaper to purchase an annual pass for $80.

Late October, and we were looking for something for one night and took a chance and drove to the campground to see if there were any vacancies. Mesa Verde was closed. We went by a sign that read all camping is done by call-in reservations. So, we called the number without success in talking with anyone and then drove up and spoke to some contractors who revealed that the Park Manager was still in the office. The nice lady got us a spot, although no hook-ups. It was a pull-through with plenty of room. However, some of the spots are not so much. And, the road through the campsite is very narrow and winds around tree and campsites.

The dump station is just as you leave the campground and there is no water available to flush out your tank.

As an alternative, there is dispersed camping about 4 to 5 miles further up the road.

Sites are in the trees. very nice for small rigs, sites are not very level. Fairly convenient to Vault toilets. There was one camper disregarding quiet hours and ran the generator all night. Price listed did not include daily vehicle pass ($9.00)/day. Mostly this park is unmanned but a ranger does make his rounds. Check in is automated at the entrance.

I stayed here while visiting Mesa Verde National Park. 20 minute drive to the park. The campsite was as far away from the entrance as it gets by road but very close by foot. Why they don't make it a loop is beyond me. The lake was way down but there was still some fishing happening. Toilets were very clean and only a few campsites access each one, so not a lot of traffic. Camp hosts pick up trash every morning and bear lockers were provided. The campsites are pretty close to one another.

This is a dry camping camp ground. They do have potable water faucets but not at the sites. Nice hiking trails that go around Jackson Lake. Campsites were nice and included a table. We had plan on dumping our tanks when leaving, however, there was not a water faucet at the dump station. Not sure how you dump without having fresh water to rinse your stinky slinky. I was also disappointed that they charged us an extra $9.00 per day for a usage fee, which is not included in your campsite fee.

My husband and I found this campground pretty disappointing compared to other Colorado state parks. There were a number of things we liked, but overall, for us the drawbacks make it unlikely that we would return. Although many of the sites are accessible to smaller RVs, I think this campground is better suited to tenters and/or those who don’t plan on staying very long.

+ This is a very convenient location, and the roads to the park are well maintained. Our site had plently of room for our 21’ travel trailer, and it had a level gravel pad. The sites are well spread out. The staff is extremely friendly and helpful. There is a dump, water faucets, and vault toilets. We had very good AT&T 4G LTE service. Very few bugs. Lots of shade. Nice birds. Coyote calls at night.

- There is no water at the dump so you can’t flush your tanks or hose. We located 4 fresh water faucets in the park, but none of them were easily accessible. There was only one that you could get close enough to fill an RV or travel trailer tank, and it was a challenge. Since it shared the drive with a pull through HA camp site, you had to either back in or back out, depending on which side your fill inlet is on. These difficulties are at the top of the list of why we wouldn’t camp here again.
The trees are tall ponderosa pines with a fairly dense understory of gambel oak. Although this provided shade and privacy, it also severely limited having much in the way of views either of the surrounding mountains or the night sky. Since the campground is at the base of the dam, that’s all you can see from the western side of the campground anyway. Also, there is a fairly heavily used dirt road across the top of the dam creating traffic noise and clouds of dust.
From Thursday through Sunday it was packed and noisy. I don’t think this was just bad luck. I think the easy access and lack of hookups attracts a different crowd than campgrounds that serve RVers. For three days, from sunrise until well past quiet hours, we listened to nonstop loud music, screaming children, partying and/or arguing adults, barkng dogs, ATVs, etc. Late Saturday afternoon we threw in the towel and started the generator so we could go inside to cool off and watch TV. Shortly after dark someone came and yelled at us to turn off the generator. He also left us a note telling us how inconsiderate we were. So apparently all of the rucus going on was fine, but running our generator for a couple of hours was a serious breach of campground etiquite. BTW, it is an expensive, low db generator, not a contractor’s special.
The lake is extremely low. The boat ramp ends 100 yards or so from the water’s edge, and the pier is on dry ground. There is that much or more exposed, bare ground all the way around the lake. The smaller second lake is completely dried up. We chose this location largely so we could kayak, but it was such a long way from where you could park to the water that we didn’t even try to put the kayak in the water. I know that there’s a drought, but since the website is still touting the lake’s water sport activities, including the great boat ramp, I was unpleasantly surprised by what is actually there. They should have an alert posted advising potential visitors of what the conditions are really like.

This to me is a real camping, with a lot of trees, no hookup, not too close to the neighbours.
Actually, we came in at a time that we were ALONE in the Main campground, so maybe it affects my opinion. (weekdays in mid-April)

T-Mobile was good, we were able to work and stream videos.

The park is at 7800 ft elevation so can be cool during spring, it was windy and cool for us.

When we arrived, we needed to buy the Annual State Park so we contact the park by phone (there was no one at the station). Within 15 minutes, the camp host came to welcome us, he was really nice! He even recommend to change spot where it was less windy.

So this is dry camping with vault toilets, and trash disposal available. Dump station (without fresh water fill) but in the Main campground there's Spigots with fresh water. All sites have fire pits and picnic tables.

There's a 5-miles trail system around the Reservoir and it is close to the Mesa Verde National Park. We had a quiet and beautiful time!

PS: This is open YEAR-round, it should be nice during Winter for ice fishing, cross country skiing, sledding, and snow shoeing.

Dry camping, vault toilets, and trash disposal available. Dump station (without fresh water fill).

Pulled into the last available 'big rig' walk-in only site on a Saturday evening in April. We felt pretty lucky that folks with smaller rigs kept to smaller sites, because I was not looking forward to trying to wriggle 40' of home on wheels into a back-in site lined off of a narrow access road lined with trees. We're totally cool with backing our monster, but while the foliage adds to ambience here, it also adds to the 'struggle' of parking.

But, we got 'the spot', which was also conveniently close to a water spigot which we were able to directly hook our hose to and fill our fresh tank. This turned out to be clutch, because the dump station (which we used on the way out the next morning) does not have a fresh water fill spigot.

So long as your cool with dodging trees and the occasional low hanging branches, this place is nice. Lots of tree cover, so don't expect to be able to utilize your solar array at most of the sites (a few looked like they could work).

Most of the sites appeared fairly level, and all have picnic table and fire rings.

Very quiet, forested, and nice trails around the lake and beyond.