El Vado Lake State Park

sigmund rodrigues

Beautiful place and if you like fishing they have fresh water salmon! So what are you waiting for, go for it. Best of luck 👍

Orion Adventures

Very clean and quite. Smallest of the NM State Parks I have stayed at. Park Host was either gone or uninterested in interacting with the campers in the area. Beautiful views and park was clean. Water level is extremely low.

Luis Hernandez

Nice place, but water is kind of far away from camping sites,reserve online.no acces to shoreline in your car. ranger lives there, they are very kind

A Smith

Dates of stay 28-30 Jun 17. Great park. Quite clean. Camp host very nice and readily accessible. It's about 4 miles to the park as you turn off of NM-112. Ice and firewood available (according to numerous signs, I didn't confirm that). Large facility split up in three major campgrounds (Grassy Point, Elk Run, Pinon Beach). There's also some primitive areas, but I didn't explore those. Grassy Point is a fairly large, wide open grass field, Elk Run much of the same. The shower/toilet facility splits Grassy Point and Elk Run...some spots here have a great overlooking view of the lake. Pinon Beach has a bit more of a camping "feel" (in my opinion). Lots of Pinon and Juniper trees mixed with sagebrush. Pinon Beach has a lot (35+) of sites ranging from room enough for a car and a tent to a 45 ft triple axle 5th wheel. At Pinon, a quite a bit of sites have a pretty good slope. I stayed at site 67 on Pinon Beach which is probably the furthest point away from the main campground. There were (at most) 3 other campsites occupied on Pinon Beach. No water spigots at Pinon Beach, just vault toilets. Very serene mornings. Winds would moderately kick up about mid-day (mostly west-to-east wind) ... afternoons had stronger winds but not bad where I stayed. Lots of birds...saw some eagles and some ospreys. Also saw two deer. On some of the taller power poles you will see Osprey nests. The lake seemed pretty full/high...I didn't get a sense of drought/low water at all. The mid-day/afternoon winds hindered paddle craft outings. 5.5 mile Rio Chama Trail is excellent...the trail is still closed at the Heron Lake end. Bring enough water for your pups and yourself...the trail does cross the Rio Chama, but pretty much at the tail end of the 5.5 mile hike. A very cool suspension bridge over the Rio Chama. No mile markers on trail from the El Vado start point...you will cross a 2 mile and a 1 mile marker, but that's from the Heron Lake side. Trail does have rocky sections...a hiking stick proved useful for more secure footing.