>>1033290If you tell me more specifically where you'll be I might be able to give you more specific advice. Generally, my priority system works like this:
1. Someplace I can sleep legally, for free, without being seen. National forest/BLM land is fucking awesome. I've spent a few nights squeezed between a couple trees, a little hill or rocks and a fence, but these locations seem to be rare enough that I wouldn't count on them. Even a couple big sagebrush can be enough to hide a bike on its side and a tent, at least after dark.
2. Someplace I can sleep legally, for free, while visible. I've had good luck asking people in tiny towns out in the prairie if I could spend the night in their town park. I haven't tried in bigger towns, largely because I'd expect them to just point me to the nearest commercial campground.
3. Someplace I can sleep for free, without being seen, not-so-legally. Churches, graveyards and schools have all made for decent nights. Obviously, spending Saturday night at a church is not the wisest plan. The general idea is that the places probably won't have visitors between sunset and sunrise, so as long as I'm not visible from the road, I don't expect to run into problems.
4. Someplace I can sleep for free, while visible, not-so-legally. I've only done this on quiet roads after dark. I do not feel terribly safe while doing so, but I'm normally too tired to spend much time worrying about it.
5. Someplace I can sleep for $. 1 night at a KOA was enough to convince me never to do it again.
If you've got more confidence in your interpersonal skills than I do, you can try asking people to use their property. I've heard of people finding places to stay that way but I've never had the need/courage to do so myself.
In big flat areas I've planned around stopping in towns or near enough trees/hills to hide me, because I've run into really long stretches where there is nowhere I'd feel comfortable sleeping adjacent to the road.
