Off Ogilby Road Dispersed Camping

First time here and really appreciated the scenic aspects and geology of this place. I think we must be here in the windy season as it’s been pretty consistent throughout our stay. Away from it all but not that far from Yuma. Sites are great as long as you stay on the “beaten” path. We had to level very little. Sunsets are beautiful and the temperature is just right.

Just south of the 6 mile marker on the east side of Ogilby Road, you'll find wide open space, pretty level and not a lot of rv's! Those that are here this winter (2020-21) are very spread out. Free water at the I-8 rest area just west of here, and a $15 dump at Chevron just east of here on I-8. Great cell coverage from Ver/ATT/TMobile. 3-4 bars with double digit downloads. Not much noise. Some road noise and a very very faint train whistle that is 2 miles south. It does tend to get very windy at times, so be prepared for that.

There are 3 or 4 roads into the camping area on the east side of Ogilby Road, each going back about a mile towards the base of the Cargo Muchachos Mountains. You can go in on any of these roads, and drive across from one to the other at the crossings through the washes. The road at the GPS coords given above had as many RVs parked along it as all the other roads combined, so I settled on the road 0.7 miles north of the railroad track, that leaves Ogilby Rd at 32.8272,-114.8371. I camped about 0.7 mile in, with my closest neighbor 1/4 mile away. I had good Verizon 4G service, with download speeds varying between 18 and 43 MB/sec.

The land on the west side of Ogilby Road is in the Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area, and requires a $35 weekly permit.

I really loved this place. It has the mountains on one side and the Imperial Sand Dunes on the other. It's not real quiet. The 2-track railroad comes from Los Angeles (it's the historic southern transcontinental railroad), and trains go by every few minutes, day and night. Personally, they didn't bother me, and I enjoyed listening to them at night.

Download the "Escape to Adventure" PDF from the Imperial Valley Joint Chambers of Commerce at ivjointchambers.org. It has lots to see all over the Imperial Valley.

At the southwest corner of the railroad crossing, there is a cemetery that is all that's left of the railroad town of Ogilby. The Tumco mine site is just north of the camping area on Ogilby Road. The last remnant of the wood plank road (San Diego's first road to the east) is on Gray's Well Road at the next exit west on I-8. The only place I could find that you can see the dunes without a permit is at the Hugh T Osborne Lookout Park on Hwy 78. I took the route along Ted Kipf Road, beside the railroad track, but even with 4-wheel-drive, I almost got stuck in sand covering the road. Ogilby Road and Hwy 78 is a better route. Being close to I-8, this is a great location for visiting Yuma. The Territorial Prison is a must - watch the movie 3:10 to Yuma before you go.

There is free water (with space to park a big rig at the faucet) and a trash dumpster at the rest area on I-8 just past the Gray's Well exit, and since the rest area is in the median, you can come back again without having to go on to the next exit. The Chevron on I-8 at Sidewinder Rd (the next exit to the east) has a dump station. I didn't use it, but someone told me it's $15. If you're coming from the west on I-8, or heading out to the west, there are free dump stations at the eastbound and westbound rest areas at Sunbeam, west of El Centro. I used the westbound one; it wasn't too clean, but it was free.