Miners Canyon Dispersed Camping

This is one of those sites that you're tempted to give a false negative review about just to keep it under the radar. But, in the spirit of free spirits...here's the honest review:

It's hard to believe this place is as quiet and peaceful as it is given it's proximity to town. The bustling town of Saratoga Springs with every amenity you'd ever want is just 15 minutes north of this boondocking location. Once you arrive, the wide gravel road leads you towards the lake. You can go all the way to the end and park near the lake, but I chose to stay on the ridge (advantage: solar!!). I'm 38 feet long and pull a GMC Acadia toad and had no trouble at all getting to a great, level, spot overlooking the lake. Bonus: my Verizon 4G is fast enough here to upload to my YouTube channel and stream some Roku shows with my Orbic hotspot (5 bars 4GLTE without a booster on the hotspot; 2 bars on the Samsung S9 Note).

There are a dozen or so others here but there is more than enough space to have privacy. You can see my neighbors in the photo and here's a link to a quick walk around of my camp: https://youtu.be/cNUE3dIFkxc

The GPS coordinates listed in for this site are dead accurate. I'm actually parked at these exact coordinates! Perfect spot!

You won't get much in the way of night skies here; there's too much light pollution from Provo across the lake. BUT, the twinkling of the distant Provo city lights at night hold their own beauty. If you park with your nose facing North, you'll be greeted by an incredible sunrise over the mountains on your patio. The setting sun in the evening will light up those mountains and reveal their colors while your rig provides lovely shade for enjoying the show and a warm campfire.

NEGATIVES: (1) The lake isn't a swimming lake; algae bloom + high salinity + mayflies (swarms of them even in fall). All of this can be avoided by camping on the high ground and simply overlooking the lake from afar. (2) Because you're close to town(s), there is some overhead jet noise occasionally; distant, but it's there. (3) As others have pointed out, there is some litter; shotgun shells, brass casings, nails where it's pretty evident someone burned a pallet or two; nothing terrible though.

10/10 will add this to my boondocking rotation!

I'm in a 26' TT w/tow vehicle F150. I didn't need to use 4x4, it's just very bumpy but if you aren't in a hurry you'll do just fine. I stayed in the mid-section on the right by the mound/hill people drive the ATV's and 4WD's on mostly because that's where I got the best cell reception. People are coming in and out to take the hills on but it didn't bother me. I'm on a work-cation so cell service is a must. I had no issues with T-mobile here, it was better than Verizon but I used both data plans for work and streaming.

The view is gorgeous and changes colors by different times of the day. The temps were perfect in mid-September, 60's - low 80's during the day and 39 - 54 at night. I only ran my heat 2 nights. No trees so plenty of sunlight for you solar panels. Closest store is about 10 miles away and another 4 miles and practically anything you want or need is close. I took the opportunity to go to the Great Salt Lake state park about 1:15 away, water was very low due to the drought but it was still beautiful. Then headed over to see the Bonneville Salt Flats which is 90 miles from the state park. Absolutely Breathtaking! I recommend the sunset hour it was unlike any sunset I have ever seen.

All in all, I give it a 4.5 star and that is because the Cleanliness. As other people have stated, there is glass, wood (even with nails sticking-up), empty shot gun shells, crushed cans and some other trash laying around. It wasn't so bad that I was really worried about it, you just have to watch where you are going and remember where it was safe to drive at night!

The views here were phenomenal. Watching the sunrise over mountains and reflect on Utah Lake was breathtaking. The part that I didn’t enjoy as much was the debris and garbage on the ground. Nails, glass, bullet casings, etc. like other reviews mentioned there were quite a few mayflies at night. They got into camper but thankfully didn’t bother us.

This is a great place to stay for the lake views and large space for any rig with easy access. Only 2 other rigs here. Close to Provo with scenic drive around the lake. The downside is the mayflies; there are a million of them and they like to hang out all over your rig and everything. Open your door and they come swarming in by the bucket load. I know they're harmless but what a mess to kill & clean up. Maybe at a different time of year it would be not so bad. Cell service was ok. Nearby Saratoga Springs has everything you need. The Smiths supermarket is awesome! Lake is very low and saw only a couple shallow bottom skiffs unload. Grounds do have some broken glass and a lot of shotgun shells, how unfortunate.

Overall a very peaceful and beautiful campsite. We arrived past sunset and had to set up our tent with nothing but the cars headlights to help us see. The bugs weren't too bad once we sprayed the tent with equipment-safe bug spray and turned the lamp off, just be careful to not set up on a fire ant hill. The moon and stars provided plenty of light once our eyes adjusted.

We were excited to take our dog for a swim in Utah Lake in the morning, but, unfortunately we read online that the lake contained algae that is harmful to dogs and people.

A little sweaty, a little dusty, but an incredible place to spend a night.

We liked this place. For our stay we had temperatures in the 70's with only a light wind and clear skies. I could see how this place would be dusty if it were windy. It is barren land and not much grass to keep the dust down but while we were here it was perfect. There are camping spots on each side of the road as you head to the water and at the end there is a large parking area. We saw campers in all of those locations. The parking area would be my last choice though. If you can find one closer to the entrance you'll have more space away from other campers.

It is BLM land with 14 day stay limits. There are private land signs on the left and a quick check of the public lands map shows a boundary between BLM and private land. Others have mentioned target shooting but there are signs up now stating no shooting allowed so that must have changed recently. We heard some shots off in the distance but nothing close to this camping area. Overall a very quite place especially at night.
While here we saw yellow headed blackbirds, pelicans, ducks, fish surfacing and even had a couple owls land on our RV in the middle of the night. Plenty of animal activity and great views.

We got 30Mbps download and 7Mbps upload with AT&T and 7Mbps download and 1Mbps upload with T-Mobile. The local Maverick station to the north has a dump station but it is not potable water and they close the doors to the garbage so you may need to go somewhere else for that.