Dead Swede
1Heads up1 fire 12 mi away
- Right now
- Listed not openA database flag with no reason and no date
- A night
- $20.50From, per site
- Sites
- 20All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 6 notices
In the agency’s own words
Dead Swede Campground is located just off the Bighorn Scenic Byway (U.S. Highway 14) near the Burgess Overlook and Woodrock areas at an elevation of 8,400 feet. The Bighorn National Forest offers a wide variety of activities, including hiking, fishing, scenic driving and a number of historic sites. The administering organization is Rustic Freedom/Gallatin Canyon Campgrounds; e-mail: support@rusticfreedom.com; phone number: 307-431-7446. Keep reading
Recreation
Off-road vehicle trails, scenic jeep roads, hiking, fishing and canoeing are available in the surrounding area. Diverse hikes vary from loop trails to treks along creeks and over mountain peaks; many trails access the Cloud Peak Wilderness. Nearby Sibley Lake is open to non-motorized craft and offers an accessible fishing dock on the shoreline. Anglers fish for rainbow, brown and brook trout.
Facilities
The campground offers several single-family sites, two of which are accessible, each equipped with a picnic table and campfire ring with grill. Accessible vault toilets, drinking water and trash collection are provided.
Natural Features
The campground is situated on the banks of the South Tongue River in the Bighorn Mountains, where craggy granite peaks rise over 13,000 feet above sea level. A forest of lodgepole pines covers the area, creating great wildlife habitat. Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (304) 431-7446.
Nearby Attractions
Decades ago, many trees in the Tie Flume area were cut for railroad ties. Remnants of the old splash dams and tie flumes are found on the nearby river. Shell Falls Visitor Center, at the overlook of Shell Falls, is about 21 miles southwest. This center offers interpretive trails, scenic views, and educational displays about natural features such as flora and fauna and area history. Bear Lodge, Elk View Inn and other nearby lodges provide guided horseback riding and fishing adventures, off-road vehicle rentals and fishing supplies, as well as dining options, showers and general stores. The Red Gulch Dinosaur Tracksite, near the town of Shell, is the largest of its kind in the state and one of only a few in the world from the Middle Jurassic Period. The tracks found here are approximately 167 million years old.
Charges & Cancellations
Refunds : Refund requests made through www.recreation.gov will be charged a $10 processing fee. This cancellation processing fee is retained by the reservation service contractor along with the non-refundable reservation fee. All requests for the return of the non-refundable reservation fee and the cancellation processing fee will be declined by the campground concessionaire as they did not receive these fees (these are the fees retained by the reservation contractor, a different entity).
What the agency tells you
The administering organization reserves the right to substitute sites without prior notice. Two non-towed vehicles allowed per site. The first vehicle is included in the basic fee; the second vehicle will be charged an extra $9.00 fee at the campground.
Groups larger than 20 people must use a Day Use facility; Willow Park, Hettinger, Ranger Creek Recreation Area or Pine Island offer group camping
Firewood bundles may be purchased from the campground host.
Everything else this campground posts · 3
Click here for more information on the Bighorn National Forest
Don't Move Firewood: Prevent the spread of tree-killing organisms by obtaining firewood at or near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org.
Refunds: Refund requests made through www.recreation.gov will be charged a $10 processing fee. This fee is retained by the reservation service contractor along with the non-refundable reservation fee. All requests for the return of the non-refundable reservation fee and the cancellation fee will be declined by the campground concessionaire as they did not receive these fees (these are the fees retained by the reservation contractor, a different entity).
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 20
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 60 ft
- Accessible sites
- 2
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…and campfire ring with grill. Accessible vault toilets, drinking water and trash collection are provided.…”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…with grill. Accessible vault toilets, drinking water and trash collection are provided. Natural Features…”
- Store
- Nearby
- Camp host
- On site
- recreation.gov lists “Host”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River, Creek, Beach
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Historic site
- Visitor center
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 157th darkest of 248 in WY
- Bortle 2
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
Every site here is reservable, and the record lists none held back for anyone who drives up.
No availability snapshot inside the last 36 hours, so this page draws nothing rather than ageing a reading into fiction.
Watch for a cancellation
Full? Watch it.
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 · 16
What you actually pay
“the second vehicle will be charged an extra $9.00/day fee at the campground.” · the U.S. Forest Service’s own fee record
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $20.50 a night, plus one $8 recreation.gov reservation fee for the booking. A weekend here means Friday and Saturday night, booked once. Optional charges (an extra vehicle, a second tent, a dump-station fee) are listed separately and aren’t in this total.
“Refunds: Refund requests made through www.recreation.gov will be charged a $10 processing fee.” · this campground’s own terms
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 · 7
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
21 records · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 20 mapped sitesAll 21 records
The price is derived by CAMPANAC, not published per site: the per-night rate this campground publishes for each site’s own site type. 20 of the 21 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| LOOP A | 001 Host | host pad | 50 ft | 232 ft | $20.50 | ||
| LOOP A | 002 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | yes | 92 ft | 376 ft | $20.50 |
| LOOP A | 003 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 92 ft | 316 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP A | 004 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 88 ft | 474 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP A | 005 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | yes | 102 ft | 524 ft | $20.50 |
| LOOP A | 006 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 87 ft | 458 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP A | 007 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 88 ft | 474 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP A | 008 | standard nonelectric | 55 ft | 87 ft | 373 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP A | 009 | standard nonelectric | 42 ft | 129 ft | 314 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP A | 010 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | 88 ft | 423 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP A | 011 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 88 ft | 395 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 012 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 88 ft | 193 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 013 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 88 ft | 134 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 014 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | 105 ft | 91 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 015 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | 234 ft | 67 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 016 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 234 ft | 105 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 017 | standard nonelectric | 50 ft | 65 ft | 79 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 018 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 65 ft | 128 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 019 | standard nonelectric | 40 ft | 66 ft | 142 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 020 | standard nonelectric | 45 ft | 75 ft | 184 ft | $20.50 | |
| LOOP B | 021 | standard nonelectric | 35 ft | 75 ft | 235 ft | $20.50 |
The agency files 1 more record here that isn’t a site for the night. It names it a host pad. It’s in the table above, marked for what it is, and it isn’t counted as a site.
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
Tie FlumeBighorn National Forest · 1.9 mi
Owen CreekBighorn National Forest · 2.8 mi
Sibley Lake CampgroundBighorn National Forest · 4.9 mi
Prune CreekBighorn National Forest · 5.6 mi
Sibley LakeBighorn National Forest · 5.7 mi
Pine Island Group AreaBighorn National Forest · 6.3 miFrom Dayton, Wyoming, travel 26.5 miles west on U.S. Highway 14 to Burgess Junction. Continue 5 miles south on U.S. Highway 14, then turn east onto Forest Road 26 and travel about 5 miles east to the campground.
The weather
the next four days
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Sheridan, WY
The land, and who answers for it
what threatens it · who answers for it
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
Dead Swede is in Wyoming’s at-large congressional district. Its representative, Harriet Hageman (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →