About this place
Bears Ears is known for what people left behind. It is a big place. There is rock art, and there are pueblo homes.
The name comes from a pair of buttes on top of Cedar Mesa. The monument itself was created in December 2016.
There is rock climbing, and the San Juan river to run. Photographers come for the views.
Camping out in the open is free, and you need no permit for it. Camp on ground that has been used before, within 150 feet of a marked route. Never camp inside an old site. Backpacking overnight in many of the Cedar Mesa canyons is different, because those trips need a permit from the Bureau of Land Management. That permit costs money.
The facts
- Cost
- Camping fee not confirmed
- Type
- Open area. Camp anywhere within it
- Managed by
- Bureau of Land Management
Getting there
The nearest towns are Monument Valley, Mexican Hat, Bluff, Blanding and Monticello. Highways 191, 211, 95, 261 and 163 each reach part of the monument.
Flying in, the big airports are Salt Lake City and St. George in Utah, Grand Junction in Colorado, and Las Vegas in Nevada. Smaller ones at Moab, Utah and Cortez, Colorado also take scheduled flights.
Coordinates 37.524446, -109.895777
Open in Google Maps Agency page
What is near here
There is another spot of ours within reach, and some better-known places further out.
- Natural Bridges National Monument Directions
- Goosenecks State Park Directions
- Dark Canyon SRMA Directions
- Abajo Peak Directions
Every distance on this page is the driving distance. A short distance can still take a long time. The road may be closed for the season, covered in snow, or washed out. Many of these roads are dirt. Plan your route before you leave home. Out here there is often no phone signal to look it up on the way.
Nearest town and supplies
- Blanding, UT Directions
Blanding is big enough that you’d normally expect fuel and somewhere to buy food. Nobody from here has been to check, so don’t count on it if you’re running low.
Why “at least”: this route is hard to measure. We worked the drive out twice, with two separate mapping tools, and they gave different answers. That usually means there is no road close to the campsite, so the drive doubles back a long way. The figure above is the longer of the two. The real drive could be further still, so check the route before you set off.
Why the drive to town is usually twice what the map says — what we found measuring every campsite in this guide.
When it’s time to move on
On most public land you can camp for 14 days before you have to move on. Check this site’s own limit before you plan a long stay. When you move on, the Bureau of Land Management usually wants you at least 25 to 30 miles away. So the free campsites closest to you are the ones you cannot use.
Nothing in this guide sits within 25 miles of here anyway. The nearest one you could move to is Dark Canyon SRMA, Utah — 28 miles in a straight line, but at least a 56 mile drive.
Why “at least”: there is no road right at this campsite, so the drive is hard to measure and the real one could be further. Check the route before you set off.
This guide covers five states and does not list every free campsite, so there may be something closer that we do not hold. Check this site’s own rule before you rely on it.
Have you been here?
Fees and access change, and the records do not always keep up. If you have been, tell us what you found.
Thank you, that is recorded. It helps the next person.
Add road notes for this site
The thing we cannot get from any government record is what the drive in is actually like. If you have done it, this is the most useful thing you can leave behind. We read everything before it appears, and we print a first name with it if you give one.
Thank you. A person will read it before it goes on the page.
Where this information comes from
The description on this page is ours. The facts in it, and the fee and facility details below it, come from the Bureau of Land Management’s own records, read in August 2026.