Fry Meadows Guard Station
4Heads up4 fires, nearest 16 mi
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 30 of the next 30 nights read 15:30 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 6 notices
In the agency’s own words
Fry Meadows Guard Station offers the peaceful solitude of a remote nature-lover's paradise just south of the Wenaha-Tucannon Wilderness and west of the Grande Ronde Wild and Scenic River. The surrounding area is steeped with native history and culture as it was once home to the Nez Perce, Umatilla, Walla Walla and Cayuse Indians. This site was originally established as a ranger station before 1908, part of the former Wenaha National Forest. The existing cabin was constructed in 1935 by the Civilian Conservation Corps and was used as a remote guard station until about 1980. Keep reading
The two-room cabin provides a pleasant escape for up to six guests. Additional guests may pitch a tent in the yard. Pets are welcome but must be leashed and outside Recreation The Wenaha-Tucannon Wilderness offers more than 200 miles of managed trails for hiking and horseback riding in summer. The Grande Ronde Wild and Scenic River offers float boating, salmon and steelhead fishing. Hunting is available nearby. Seasonal mushroom and berry picking can also be enjoyed. Huckleberries, blackberries and morel mushrooms are among the edible picks.
Facilities
The cabin is a classic 1930s Civilian Conservation Corps two-room design. It is equipped with a propane cook stove, propane heater and propane lights. Furnishings include two full beds and two twin beds with mattresses, tables and chairs, limited cleaning supplies, cooking pots and utensils. A vault toilet is located a short distance from the cabin. The cabin has no water. Visitors must bring plenty for drinking, cooking and washing. Please bring sleeping bags or bedding, a flashlight, first aid kit, washcloths, towels and dish soap. Click here for more cabin details.
Natural Features
Tucked beneath the shady canopy of towering spruce and fir, the guard station sits at the edge of an expansive meadow of grasses and wildflowers, such as lupine, larkspur, monkey flower and orchid. As the afternoon slides into evening, deer and elk come out to graze. Hawks perch in treetops or glide over the meadow, scanning the grass for field mice and other critters. In the morning, many varieties of birds, including flycatchers, hummingbirds, swallows, chickadees, creepers, wrens, kinglets, thrushes, sparrows, warblers, tanagers and finches, greet the day.
Nearby Attractions
This site is located about 25 miles northeast of Elgin, Oregon, which offers general stores and gas stations. Contact Info This location is unstaffed. To speak with our main office for general information, please call: (509) 522-6276.
What the agency tells you
Entry to cabin is by combination lock; please call the Walla Walla Ranger District prior to arrival at (509) 522-6290, Monday-Friday, 8:00 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Please bring garbage bags; this is a 'pack in-pack out' facility
No pack animals or livestock allowed at the cabin
Everything else this campground posts · 3
For current fire restrictions and closures, click here
Don't Move Firewood: Please protect Pacific Northwest forests by preventing the spread of invasive species. Firewood can carry insects and diseases that can threaten the health of our western forests. You can make a difference by obtaining and burning your firewood near your camping destination. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.
Guests should be aware that there is a risk of exposure to hantavirus when visiting remote cabins; click here to learn more
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- VAULT TOILETS on 1 of 1 campsite records
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…distance from the cabin. The cabin has no water. Visitors must bring plenty for drinking, cooking…”
- Store
- Nearby
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- River, Meadow
- Birding
- Historic site
- Hunting
- Mountain Climbing
- Wildlife viewing
- Fall color · reported 4 days ago, 18 km away
- Patchy color
Full this Saturdayread 15:30 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBooked
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday. 1 is free on Wed, Oct 21. read 15:30 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 15:30 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.
Measured shade is NLCD Tree Canopy Cover 2024 (USDA Forest Service / MRLC) read at the site’s own coordinate, 27% canopy or more, and only for the sites the agency gave no Shade value. It never changes the agency’s own shaded count beside it.
| AREA FRY MEADOWS GUARD STATION | 001 | cabin nonelectric | 2,808 ft | $40 |
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
Jubilee Lake Campground (OR)Umatilla National Forest · 7.2 miMottet CampgroundUmatilla National Forest · 8.4 mi
Woodland CampgroundUmatilla National Forest · 9.5 miWoodland CampgroundUmatilla National Forest · 10 mi
Target Meadows CampgroundUmatilla National Forest · 12 mi
Woodward CampgroundUmatilla National Forest · 13 miFrom Weston, Oregon: Travel 20 miles east of Weston on Highway 204. Turn left (north) onto Forest Service Road 64 and follow it for approximately 11 miles to the junction with Forest Service Road 63. Turn right onto Forest Service Road 63 and travel about 8.8 miles to the junction with Forest Service Road 62. Turn left onto Forest Service Road 62 and travel for 3.9 miles to Forest Service Road 6235. Turn right onto Forest Service Road 6235 and travel for about 1.1 miles to the Fry Meadows Guard Station, which will be on the right.
From Elgin, OR, drive on the Elgin-Palmer Junction County Road for about 15 miles to the junction with the Lookingglass Road/FSR 63. Go down Lookingglass Road for about 2 miles to the end of the pavement; FSR 63 starts here. Continue on FSR 63 for about 4.7 miles to the junction with FSR 62. Turn right on FSR 62 and travel about 3.9 miles to FSR 6235. Turn right on FSR 6235 and travel about 1.1 miles to the Fry Meadow Cabin, which will be on the right.
Generally, Fry Meadows can be accessed by vehicle from mid-May to mid-November, and parking is available at the cabin. .
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Elgin, OR
Typical weather
Typical October night 30°F, day 63°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 18°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 Augusts are colder than the August 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
Fry Meadows Guard Station is in Oregon’s 2nd congressional district. Its representative, Cliff Bentz (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 moneyCliff BentzU.S. Representative · Oregon’s 2nd district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJeff MerkleyU.S. Senator · Oregon
- Your senator, on the same appropriationRon WydenU.S. Senator · Oregon
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 Fry Meadows Guard Station, Umatilla National Forest, Oregon
Dear Cliff Bentz, I’m a constituent in Oregon’s 2nd district. I tried to camp at Fry Meadows Guard Station, Umatilla National Forest, Oregon, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Fry Meadows 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. Fry Meadows Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Fry Meadows 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 Fry Meadows Guard Station (Umatilla National Forest, Oregon) 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 Fry Meadows Guard Station, Umatilla National Forest, Oregon
Dear Jeff Merkley, I’m a constituent in Oregon. I tried to camp at Fry Meadows Guard Station, Umatilla National Forest, Oregon, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Fry Meadows 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. Fry Meadows Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Fry Meadows 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 Fry Meadows Guard Station (Umatilla National Forest, Oregon) 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 Fry Meadows Guard Station, Umatilla National Forest, Oregon
Dear Ron Wyden, I’m a constituent in Oregon. I tried to camp at Fry Meadows Guard Station, Umatilla National Forest, Oregon, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Fry Meadows 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. Fry Meadows Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Fry Meadows 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 Fry Meadows Guard Station (Umatilla National Forest, Oregon) via campanac.com