Bend Guard Station
1Heads up1 fire 18 mi away
We don’t think it should be. Every campground should hold some sites for whoever drives up.Tell your representative →
- Right now
- Taking bookingsSites offered on 26 of the next 30 nights read 16:36 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 9 notices
In the agency’s own words
The Bend Guard Station is located in a historic site within the Lolo National Forest of northwestern Montana. It is equipped with modern features, including a full-service kitchen and bathrooms, and provides guests with access to a variety of activities. The cabin sits within an open meadow surrounded by an evergreen forest, providing beautiful scenery during any season. Keep reading
Recreation
The Bend area offers opportunities for a variety of outdoor recreation experiences, including hiking, fishing, mountain biking, cross country skiing, snowshoeing and berry picking. A variety of trails snake around the campground and through the forest, several of which are accessible near the cabin. The Thompson River is a short walk from the cabin. Anglers might see a variety of trout as well as mountain whitefish in the river.
Facilities
The two-story cabin has four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a large kitchen and a living area. Beds with mattresses can sleep up to 16 people. It has electric heaters, flush toilets, hot showers and a fully furnished kitchen, with modern appliances including a two electric stoves, a microwave, two refrigerators and two sinks with running hot and cold water. Basic cooking and eating utensils are also supplied. Guests will need to bring their own bedding, food, toilet paper and garbage bags. The cabin will need to be cleaned before leaving and basic cleaning equipment is provided. A horse corral is also located on the property. A frost-free water hydrant also services the corral area. The cabin is available to rent year-round, except for a week in the month of May, when it is reserved for administrative and educational uses. A key code will be provided after a reservation is made. The key code gives you access to the entry gate and a lock box, which holds the key to unlock the cabin. Please make sure to return the key to the lock box before leaving the facility.
Natural Features
The 3,200-foot elevation site has multiple structures and has previously been used as a ranger station for the old Cabinet National Forest, which was divided by the Forest Service in 1954. The original log cabin is on-site and was constructed in 1911. While there are several buildings at Bend, the only one available for recreation rental use is the combined bunkhouse and cookhouse building. It was built in 1923 to house Forest Service work crews and rangers working in the area and was remodeled in 1984. The 2 million-acre forest includes four wilderness areas and a wide variety of trees, plants and wildlife. The area is home to mountain goats, bighorn sheep, elk, moose, deer and grizzly and black bears. Both the bald and golden eagle reside in the forest, along with trumpeter swan, herons and dozens of varieties of duck. The cabin is accessible by vehicle, but requires high-clearance with tire chains during winter months. The roads leading to the cabin may not be plowed on a regular basis in the winter. Four-wheel drive is highly recommended. There is no cell phone service or a land line at Bend. The nearest cell phone service is a few miles away. Guests are responsible for their own travel arrangements and safety, and must bring several of their own amenities. Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (406) 210-5287.
Nearby Attractions
Fishing and water sports are available at Thompson and McGregor Lakes, both of which are a 30-minute drive from the cabin.
What the agency tells you
This facility is located in a remote area; before making a reservation, become aware of bear, water, and weather safety.
The entry gate and cabin remain locked; a key code will be sent to you in your reservation confirmation.
All garbage, food and personal belongings must be packed out.
Everything else this campground posts · 6
Learn more about the Lolo National Forest at: https://www.fs.usda.gov/lolo
Don't Move Firewood: Prevent the spread of tree-killing pests by obtaining firewood near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org.
The cabin is accessible by vehicle, but requires high-clearance with tire chains during winter months. The roads leading to the cabin may not be plowed on a regular basis in the winter. Four-wheel drive is highly recommended.
There is no cell phone service or a land line at Bend. The nearest cell phone service is a few miles away.
The maximum stay limit is 5 nights per reservation.
PETS are not permitted inside the buildings at any time. Please clean up after your pets!
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- 1 electric
- Longest rig
- 40 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- “…to 16 people. It has electric heaters, flush toilets, hot showers and a fully furnished kitchen, with…”
- Showers
- Yes, the record doesn’t say what kind
- Shower/Bath Type states a shower on all 1 of this campground's campsite records
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…located on the property. A frost-free water hydrant also services the corral area. The cabin is…”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River, Meadow
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Historic site
- Hunting
- Wildlife viewing
- Winter sports
- Night sky · 156th darkest of 501 in MT
- Bortle 2
- Cell signal · Cell signal · Forest Service says
- None
Full this Saturdayread 16:36 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBookedClosed
The one site on offer is taken this Friday and Saturday. 1 is free on Tue, Oct 20. read 16:36 UTC Why the weekend fills and the week doesn’t
Watch for a cancellation
Watch this campground
One email when a night opens, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We read recreation.gov once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time a site in your window is free for the nights you asked for.
Scanners that check every few minutes exist, and most of them charge. This one is free, it reads the same calendar, and it won’t always be first.
We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.
Every line of the receipt · 13
What you actually pay
Who keeps the booking fee
The agency’s own policy text says the reservation fee and the cancellation processing fee are “retained by the reservation service contractor”, and that a campground concessionaire will decline to refund them because “they did not receive these fees”. Recreation.gov is run under contract by Booz Allen Hamilton. What share of your booking fee the contractor keeps isn’t published in any federal dataset we can read, so we print no number for it. Our reporting on the contract →
How we know this receipt · 5
recreation.gov availability, read 16:36 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
1 sites · the site map
All 1 sites
Toilet distances are OpenStreetMap’s, measured for 1 of the 1 sites listed. A site with no reading is unknown, never far.
The price is derived by CAMPANAC, not published per site: the per-night rate this campground publishes for each site’s own site type. 1 of the 1 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| AREA BEND GUARD STATION | 001 | cabin electric | 40 ft | 1,611 ft | 199 ft | $90 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
McGregor Lake CampgroundKootenai National Forest · 11 miSylvan Lake CampgroundKootenai National Forest · 11 mi
Meadow Peak Lookout (MT)Kootenai National Forest · 13 miWillow Creek CampgroundKaniksu National Forest · 13 miThis rental is located approximately 32 miles up the Thompson River Road (County Road 56 on maps, County Road 556 on the ground) from its junction with Montana Highway 200, five miles east of Thompson Falls, Montana. It may also be accessed from U.S. Highway 2 by turning south on the Thompson River Road (County Road 56 on maps, County Road 556 on the ground) between McGregor Lake and Lower Thompson Lake, approximately 40 miles west of Kalispell, Montana. After leaving Highway 2 or 200, area roads are low standard gravel or dirt and are often rough. Area roads also serve logging trucks and should be driven with care. During the winter, it may be necessary to hike, ski or snowmobile for at least a mile to the cabin, as roads are not always plowed. Maps are available online or for purchase by calling the Plains/Thompson Falls Ranger District.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Happys Inn, MT
Typical weather
Typical October night 27°F, day 52°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 15°F, below freezing. Bring a bag rated colder than that, and expect ice in the water bottle.
Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or more
A normal is the 1991-2020 average for the month, not a forecast: about half of all Julys are colder than the July line. The seven-day forecast above answers the other question.
The land, and who answers for it
who answers for it · a letter you can send
Who answers for this land
Bend Guard Station is in Montana’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Ryan Zinke (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →
Who can change it · 3
Two offices, two different asks. The draft to the agency asks it to set aside a published share of the sites here for whoever drives up. The draft to Congress asks why that share is zero and presses for a published minimum at the campgrounds it funds.
- The member who votes the moneyRyan K. ZinkeU.S. Representative · Montana’s 1st district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationSteve DainesU.S. Senator · Montana
- Your senator, on the same appropriationTim SheehyU.S. Senator · Montana
Read the draft, or change the wording
For the camper who turned up, or tried to book, and couldn’t get in. Every draft is written from this campground’s own record (its agency, its unit, its site count and its own weekend) and the buttons above copy whichever wording is selected here.
Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.
Subject Walk-up camping at Bend Guard Station, Lolo National Forest, Montana
Dear Ryan K. Zinke, I’m a constituent in Montana’s 1st district. I tried to camp at Bend Guard Station, Lolo National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Bend Guard Station are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Bend Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Bend Guard Station. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund. The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them. Sent about Bend Guard Station (Lolo National Forest, Montana) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.
Subject Walk-up camping at Bend Guard Station, Lolo National Forest, Montana
Dear Steve Daines, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at Bend Guard Station, Lolo National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Bend Guard Station are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Bend Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Bend Guard Station. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund. The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them. Sent about Bend Guard Station (Lolo National Forest, Montana) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the question to the agency in writing, and to press for a published minimum share of walk-up sites across the campgrounds they fund.
Subject Walk-up camping at Bend Guard Station, Lolo National Forest, Montana
Dear Tim Sheehy, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at Bend Guard Station, Lolo National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Bend Guard Station are reservable, and the agency's own record lists none held back for somebody who drives up. On Saturday, October 17, the one site recreation.gov was offering there was already booked. 1,623 of the 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Bend Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Bend Guard Station. I’m asking you to put it to the U.S. Forest Service in writing: why is the share of first-come sites there zero, and what would a published minimum share cost? Please press for that minimum at the federal campgrounds you fund. The people who open these campgrounds, collect the fees and keep the water running are seasonal positions. At GS-5, base pay plus the government's own 36.25% benefit factor, one costs about $47,414 a year. One percent of the $13.3 billion the USS Gerald R. Ford cost to procure would pay for about 2,800 of them for a year. Both figures are the government's own (a Congressional Research Service report and an OPM pay table), and I’m glad to send them. Sent about Bend Guard Station (Lolo National Forest, Montana) via campanac.com
How we know this · 4
How we know
every fact on this page, and where it came from
“…Four-wheel drive is highly recommended. There is no cell phone service or a land line at Bend. The nearest cell phone service is a…”