Carlsbad Caverns area RV parking

Yes, White City is a good choice. Saves a lot of driving after the bats come out in the evening.
We dry camped in a parking area across from the RV park.

Good luck. Most RV sites in eastern New Mexico and west Texas are taken up by oil and gas industry workers. I am a native New Mexican and we wanted to take the grandkids to see the caverns this past spring. No RV sites within 100 miles and the only hotel rooms within that radius were going for $300 - $400 a night! All the businesses were very up-front with us - with the new pipeline construction and restarts on drilling, the oil companies will pay the prices and the workers are happy to have a place to stay. Dry camping someplace you won't get a knock on the door at 2:00 AM may be your only choice.

Rob

Brantley Lake State Park is about twenty miles and a half hour's drive from the Caverns Visitor Center. It has hookups with modern and clean restrooms. I'd also recommend a stop at the Living Desert Zoo and Museum State Park while in the area.

Our favorite camping spot in that area is Dog Canyon campground in Guadalupe Mountain NP. The facilities aren't much, just a gravel lot backing up to a horse corral, but the canyon is beautiful and we usually have the place to ourselves other than maybe a few tent campers. Its about an hour from the Caverns. If interested, drop me a PM and I can give more specifics.

We stayed at the KOA while in Carlsbad a few years ago, Staff was great as well as the C/G itself. Good Luck and Happy Camping !!

As mentioned before, there is a ton of activity there due to oil field workers.

md_procouple wrote:
We stayed at the KOA while in Carlsbad a few years ago, Staff was great as well as the C/G itself. Good Luck and Happy Camping !!

Same here. But it was 4 yrs ago. But at the time it was the only one in the area with good reviews. The one at White City was most convenient but had poor reviews. Things may have changed.

enblethen wrote:
Yes, White City is a good choice. Saves a lot of driving after the bats come out in the evening.
We dry camped in a parking area across from the RV park.

They won’t be seeing bats if they’re going in the next few months.

jfkmk, I'm not certain about the comment about the bats. Explain??

The bats migrate. They are there normally May-October. That is one of the great items about Carlsbad for us. Very unique!Bats

enblethen wrote:
The bats migrate. They are there normally May-October. That is one of the great items about Carlsbad for us. Very unique!Bats

Exactly. We were there in early November and missed the bats. :(
Nonetheless, it is an awesome place where we will return. As someone stated, the area has a lot of oil field workers. We were not camping, and the hotel was probably 60% oil field workers. No issue there, just an observation.