staehpj1

I guess it depends on where you camp, but I definitely have not found this to be the case in much of the US. On the Trans America we found lots of camp sites that were $8-$12 and shared the cost between three of us. Some charged per person (often $4), some charged per tent (three of us shared a tent), and some charged per site.

In the west, state and national parks and forests were very reasonable. In the middle of the country there always seemed to be a place to stay for free. The east was probably the worst for camp site prices, but we often stayed with friends of friends or relatives. When that failed if there was no free place listed on the AC maps we managed to find free places to stay by asking at churches, city parks, and church camps.

We stayed for free more than half of the time, either because someone invited us to stay with them or because we stayed in a city park or at a church. When we did pay many places had a bicycle discount.

There were only a very few (I could count them on one hand) times when we paid for an expensive site ($20 or a bit more). The few times we paid for an expensive site it was usually because it was HOT and they had a pool and again we split the cost three ways.

Speaking of pools... many of the free city parks let us use the pool for free too.

We did have one guy who tried to charge us $10 per person and call it a bicyclist's discount. This despite the fact that if we showed up in a car the three of us could have stayed for $20. We went up the road a few miles and they let us stay for $5 per person and said normally they would upgrade us to a cabin for no extra charge except they were all booked that night.

It is a bit worse if alone since you aren't splitting the cost, but you can often meet folks on the road to share a site with. Also places with hiker biker site are usually reasonable and charge per person.