Jackson Guard Station
1Heads up1 fire 14 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 27 of the next 30 nights read 15:03 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 12 notices
In the agency’s own words
Jackson Guard Station is a great destination for anything from a weekend getaway to a week-long hunting trip. The cabin was originally used as a guard station that housed Forest Service work crews. The cabin's access road is remarkably scenic, making for an impressive arrival. In summer months, the cabin sets the stage for a wide array of activities. Recreation ranges from thrilling off-road vehicle riding to amazing scenery viewsing,hiking,and rewarding fishing. Winter access is by snowmobile, cross country skiing or snowshoes,and fat bikes only along a 3.5-mile trail. Keep reading
Recreation
Activities abound, with hiking, technical single track dirtbiking, ATV/OTV riding, snowshoing, cross country skiing. Hunting and fishing are popular in the area Facilities Visitors can expect a rustic cabin set back roughly 100 feet from the road, providing privacy and solitude. Amenities include wood stove. The kitchen includes cabinet space and some dishes are provided. The cabin has two bedrooms and four twin-size beds. A picnic table, campfire ring and vault toilet are located just outside the cabin. No electricity or running water is available. Guests should bring drinking water, flashlights or lanterns, bedding, food, towels and toiletries. In winter, kettles are provided to melt snow for water. A snow shovel and firewood is provided.
Natural Features
Situated near the southeast shores of Silver Jack Reservoir, Jackson Guard Station sits in a small aspen grove at 9,000 feet elevation. The cabin is at the base of High Mesa, near where the Cimarron River flows into the reservoir.
Nearby Attractions
Nearby attractions include the San Juan Mountains, Alpine Plateau, Uncompahgre Wilderness, Silver Jack Reservoir and Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. The cabin is about an hour's drive from Montrose or Ridgway, and an hour and a half from Gunnison.
What the agency tells you
No drinking water available
Collection of firewood is not permitted; please bring firewood in summer months; in winter, firewood is provided
Please bring garbage bags; this is a 'pack in-pack out' facility
Everything else this campground posts · 9
Please clean cabin before leaving; cleaning supplies are provided
No discharge of firearms within 150 yards of cabin
No smoking allowed
No pets allowed
This facility does not meet accessibility standards
Bears frequent the area; keep all food out of sight in approved containers or locked inside your vehicle and remove all food from area after eating
Guests should be aware that there is a risk of exposure to hantavirus when visiting remote cabins; click here to learn more
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.
Winter Cabin rental: Access to cabin in winter months by snowmobile, cross-country skiing, snowshoes only. There is a parking lot before the Forest Boundary to unload snowmobiles and park your vehicles. Mileage to cabin from parking lot is approximately 3.5 miles. Two kettles are provided to melt snow for water. Firewood is provided for the winter months only. Snow Shovel provided.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…beds. A picnic table, campfire ring and vault toilet are located just outside the cabin. No electricity…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “Guests should bring drinking water, flashlights or lanterns, bedding, food, towels and toiletries.”
- Firewood
- Mentioned
Around the campground
- On the water
- Reservoir, River
- Canoeing
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Hunting
- Kayaking
- Non-Motorized Boating
- Off Road Vehicle Trails
- Paddle Boating
- Snowshoeing
- Stargazing
- Wildlife viewing
- Fall color · reported 7 days ago, 39 km away
- Patchy color
Full this Saturdayread 15:03 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
2 campgrounds have sites open within 30 miles, read 15:14 UTC. See them
OpenBookedNot on the booking system
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday, and on two midweek nights after it as well. read 15:03 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 · 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
Open within 30 miles this weekend · 2
Sites the agency is offering this Friday and Saturday that nobody has taken, nearest first. read 15:14 UTC
- Lake Fork CampgroundGunnison Field Office · 20 mi · 81 of 82 site-nights open
- Elk Creek CampgroundCurecanti National Recreation Area · 26 mi · 61 of 80 site-nights open
recreation.gov availability, read 15:03 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.
| JACKSON GUARD STATION | 001 | cabin nonelectric | 336 ft | 3,165 ft | $75 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Alpine Ranger StationUncompahgre National Forest · 7.6 miThe Gate CampgroundGunnison Field Office · 15 miFrom Montrose, take Highway 50 east for about 20 miles. Turn right (south) onto County Road 858, which leads up the Big Cimarron Drainage for about 20 miles. Shortly after passing Silver Jack Reservoir on the right, Jackson Guard Station will be on the left.
From Gunnison, take Highway 50 west for roughly 43 miles. Turn left on County Road 858, which leads up the Big Cimarron Drainage for about 20 miles. Shortly after passing Silver Jack Reservoir on the right, Jackson Guard Station will be on the left.
In winter, park in parking lot before the Forest Boundary and ski, snowshoe or snowmobile up the road for 3.5 miles.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Portland, CO
Typical weather
Typical October night 28°F, day 60°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 1°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
Jackson 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 Jackson Guard Station, Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado
Dear Jeff Hurd, I’m a constituent in Colorado’s 3rd district. I tried to camp at Jackson Guard Station, Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Jackson 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. Jackson Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Jackson 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 Jackson Guard Station (Uncompahgre 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 Jackson Guard Station, Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado
Dear John W. Hickenlooper, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Jackson Guard Station, Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Jackson 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. Jackson Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Jackson 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 Jackson Guard Station (Uncompahgre 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 Jackson Guard Station, Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado
Dear Michael F. Bennet, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Jackson Guard Station, Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Jackson 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. Jackson Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Jackson 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 Jackson Guard Station (Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado) via campanac.com