Carnero Guard Station
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 29 of the next 30 nights read 15:20 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 15 notices
In the agency’s own words
Carnero Guard Station is situated in a high open meadow surrounded by forest at an elevation of 9,840 feet. The high-elevation cabin is located in the north-central area of the San Luis Valley in the Rio Grande National Forest. The guard station was first proposed in 1907 by the Cochetopa National Forest, and was originally named the John Smith Ranger Station after a homesteader who built a cabin near the site, but never filed on the land. Construction on the cabin began in 1908 and the name was changed to the Carnero Guard Station in 1916. Keep reading
Recreation
The cabin is a good base camp for hunting, and fishing, which is available at several creeks within a short drive. The area also offers many opportunities for hiking and off-road vehicle adventures in summer, and cross country skiing and snowmobiling in the winter. There is an off-road vehicle trail about 10 miles southwest of the cabin that travels to within 2 miles of the La Garita Wilderness. Elk, deer, and other wildlife are often seen in meadows adjacent to the cabin, and moose have been spotted in the Moon Pass area, about 5 miles west.
Facilities
The two-room cabin is furnished with four bunk beds (the top bunk is a single bed, the bottom is a fold-out futon couch that sleeps two) and can accommodate up to 12 people. The cabin has a stove, refrigerator, heater and lighting, all powered with propane. The kitchen is equipped with a table and chairs, cooking utensils and some pots and pans. A picnic table, fire pit and an outdoor vault toilet are also on site. There is no electricity at the cabin, however water is available by an outside hand pump. Water is also available at the Saguache Ranger District Office during business hours from May through November.
Natural Features
Volcanic rock outcroppings dot the forested hillsides and wide pastures near the cabin. The La Garita Wilderness is located approximately 20 miles west of the guard station and features about 35 miles of the Continental Divide well above the timberline. This area also provides habitats for large herds of elk and mule deer, and on the southern slopes, there is an ancient forest of towering spruce and fir. It is a landscape of rushing streams, broad and gentle alpine meadows, beaver ponds, long talus slopes and tremendous mountain beauty.
Nearby Attractions
Guests at Carnero Guard Station are a short drive from Penitente Canyon, which has become a great draw for rock climbing.
What the agency tells you
Please contact the Saguache Ranger District prior to arriving at the cabin to check on any restrictions or conditions, such as fire or road closures, weather or storms that may affect the quality of your visit.
Entry to the cabin is by combination lock, which will be provided in the confirmation letter or email which is sent after a reservation is made. They keypad on the door may have multiple digits per button. The button needs to only be pressed once, regardless of the number assigned, before entering the next code.
The maximum stay limit on the forest is 14 days. You may be visited by a Forest Employee during your stay, for routine cabin safety check and maintenance/cleaning. If you wish to not be disturbed, a door tab will be available to use.
Everything else this campground posts · 12
There is no electricity at the Guard Station. No cell phone service is available at this facility.
All appliances run on propane. Please ensure that at least two windows are cracked open AT ALL TIMES during your stay and on departure, to avoid carbon monoxide poisoning.
For safety and resource protection, do not discharge firearms and skeet shooting is prohibited within 150 yards of the cabin area boundary.
Water is available at the guard station by outside hand pump. Water is available at the Saguache Ranger District office during business hours from Memorial Day weekend to November.
All cabins are administratively used on occasion. You may encounter agency stock horses during your stay. Do not pet, feed or try to ride the animals.
The guard station is a non-smoking facility.
Pets are allowed at the facility, but must be under control at all times; they must not harass wildlife or livestock. Pets are not allowed to be on the furniture, including beds, couches, and chairs. Pet hair on those surfaces are very difficult to remove, and can cause allergic reactions. Be considerate of others.
Livestock are prohibited: including horses, mules, llamas, and alpacas.
Do not leave food or trash outside the guard station; there are wildlife in the area. All garbage and food must be packed out; do NOT burn garbage in the fire pit.
Please clean the guard station before leaving and ensure the gate is locked upon departure.
Drink plenty of water before arrival and during your stay to avoid altitude sickness.
During the later end of the open season, you may need to snowmobile, snowshoe or ski to access the cabin.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 40 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…A picnic table, fire pit and an outdoor vault toilet are also on site. There is no electricity at the…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…is no electricity at the cabin, however water is available by an outside hand pump. Water is also available at…”
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Creek, Meadow
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Hunting
- Wildlife viewing
- Winter sports
- Night sky · 37th darkest of 522 in CO
- Bortle 2
Full this Saturdayread 15:20 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBookedNot on the booking system
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday, and on three midweek nights after it as well. read 15:20 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.
Tell me when the season opens
Watch for the season to open
One email when the season goes on sale, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We check once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time the agency has that season on sale.
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 · 12
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 15:20 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
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.
| CARNERO | 001 | cabin nonelectric | 40 ft | 897 ft | $50 |
OpenStreetMap has no toilet mapped within 1 km of this campground, so no site here carries a toilet distance. That’s a gap in the map, not a finding about the campground.
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Storm King CampgroundRio Grande National Forest · 2.1 mi
Poso CampgroundRio Grande National Forest · 5.5 mi
Upper Crossing Guard StationSan Luis Valley Field Office · 11 mi
Penitente Canyon CampgroundSan Luis Valley Field Office · 13 mi
Stone Cellar Guard StationRio Grande National Forest · 14 miBuffalo Pass CampgroundRio Grande National Forest · 15 miCarnero Guard Station may be reached by traveling south on Highway 285 approximately 15 miles south of Saguache to the La Garita turnoff (Road G). In La Garita proceed west on County Road 41G for approximately 17 miles. Look for the cabin on the right.
NOTE: Forest Road 41G leading to the cabin is unimproved but may be traveled by passenger car, weather permitting. The cabin may also be accessed from Highway 114 west of Saguache, also on Forest Road 41G. During winter months, the cabin may be accessible only by snowmobile, skis or snowshoes.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Saguache, CO
Typical weather
Typical October night 26°F, day 61°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 6°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
what threatens it · who answers for it · a letter you can send
Roadless country, and what’s coming for it
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Carnero Guard Station is in Colorado’s 3rd congressional district. Its representative, Jeff Hurd (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 moneyJeff HurdU.S. Representative · Colorado’s 3rd district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJohn W. HickenlooperU.S. Senator · Colorado
- Your senator, on the same appropriationMichael F. BennetU.S. Senator · Colorado
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 Carnero Guard Station, Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado
Dear Jeff Hurd, I’m a constituent in Colorado’s 3rd district. I tried to camp at Carnero Guard Station, Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Carnero 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 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Carnero Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Carnero 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 Carnero Guard Station (Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado) 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 Carnero Guard Station, Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado
Dear John W. Hickenlooper, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Carnero Guard Station, Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Carnero 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 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Carnero Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Carnero 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 Carnero Guard Station (Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado) 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 Carnero Guard Station, Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado
Dear Michael F. Bennet, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Carnero Guard Station, Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Carnero 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 7,647 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Carnero Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Carnero 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 Carnero Guard Station (Rio Grande National Forest, Colorado) via campanac.com