Lid Creek Campground
2Heads up2 fires, nearest 40 mi
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $18From, per site
- Sites
- 23All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 11 notices
In the agency’s own words
Lid Creek Campground lies on the Hungry Horse Reservoir, in the heart of the Rocky Mountains, west of the Continental Divide and just south of the Canadian border. Spectacular views and ample opportunities for recreation surround the campground, keeping visitors coming back to the area again and again. Here, we have 22 rentable sites with 13 of them being reservable and 9 for our walk-up visitors. The stay limit is 16 consecutive nights. Keep reading
Recreation
Visitors to the area enjoy a variety of biking and hiking trails that begin near the campground and wind around the reservoir. Boating, swimming and fishing are excellent pastimes on the 27,750-acre Hungry Horse Reservoir. Anglers can expect a catch of cutthroat trout and other varieties.
Facilities
The campground offers 22 campsites, several of which are first-come, fist-served sites for tent and RV camping. Each site is equipped with tables and campfire rings with grills. Vault toilets are provided, but drinking water is not available at the campground.
Natural Features
The campground is located along the Hungry Horse Reservoir within the Flathead National Forest in northwestern Montana. It is nestled in a mixed forest of conifers at an elevation of 3,600 feet. The area is popular for its plentiful huckleberry bushes. Home to lynx, grizzly bear, and bull trout and with numerous lakes, streams, and rivers to enjoy, the forest is a premiere destination for visitors.
Nearby Attractions
Lid Creek Campground is just 23 miles southwest of the West Glacier entrance into Glacier National Park.
Charges & Cancellations
No cancellations can be made within 4 days of your arrival date through recreation.gov. You must wait for your reservation dates to pass then call Cheryl at 406-752-PWAI (7924) or 406-404-4164 to turn in a Refund Request. Refunds can then be considered, by the concessionaire, of Camping fees only. You will automatically forfeit the first nights fee. Any cancellations within 4 days of your arrival must be turned to Cheryl also, to get the information to the campground Host. Otherwise your site will be held for you and there will be no chance for a refund. All Considerations can only be made after your original reservation dates have passed. *No shows have no chance of a refund.
What the agency tells you
CHECK OUT IS AT 11:00 A.M. Check in is at 2:00 p.m.
If a site is not available for reservation online, it is shown as a first-come, first-served (FF) or walk-in (W) site. These sites will be identified at the campground on maps and campsite post markers with a W. First-come, First-served sites may already be taken as this cannot be updated on the Recreation.gov website. You may try to call for availability.
Reserved sites will be held until check out time (11am) the day following your arrival date. Sites must be occupied by the checkout time of that following day to hold a reservation or the site will be forfeited and released.
Everything else this campground posts · 8
We do not allow reservation holders to change campsites and move to a Walk-up campsite upon arrival. Most of our campsites are available for advanced reservations, and you must occupy the site you reserve.
You are allowed 2 passenger vehicles per site, the first vehicle is included in the site fee and an extra vehicle charge of $5.00/vehicle per night will be collected at the campground. Sites that are identified as double occupancy can accommodate an additional camping unit. In this situation, you will be charged for each camper.
Drop Camping is illegal without a Forest Service permit. If you rent a camper it may not be delivered by the owner.
There is a food storage order in effect on the Flathead National Forest. Know how to store all attractants all the time. See your Campground Host for more information or visit: https://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/flathead/recreation/?cid=stelprdb5347448
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.
Drinking water is not provided
The West Side Reservoir Road is narrow with many switchbacks. Not suitable for larger RV's. Please use caution.
https://www.fs.usda.gov/flathead Click here for more information on the Flathead National Forest
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 23
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 49 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…tables and campfire rings with grills. Vault toilets are provided, but drinking water is not available…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…grills. Vault toilets are provided, but drinking water is not available at the campground. Natural Features The campground…”
- Store
- Nearby
- Camp host
- On site
- recreation.gov lists “Host”
- Stay limit
- 32 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Reservoir, Lake, River, Creek
- Biking
- Boating
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Swimming
- Wildlife viewing
- Night sky · 428th darkest of 501 in MT
- Bortle 3
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 · 14
What you actually pay
“the second vehicle is charged $5.00 upon arrival at the campground.” · the U.S. Forest Service’s own fee record
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $18 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.
“No cancellations can be made within 4 days of your arrival date through recreation.gov. You must wait for your reservation dates to pass then call Cheryl at 406-752-PWAI (7924) or 406-404-4164 to turn in a Refund Request. Refunds can then be considered, by the concessionaire, of Camping fees only. You will automatic…” · this campground’s own no-show 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 Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
23 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 23 mapped sitesAll 23 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. 23 of the 23 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 001 | standard nonelectric | 61 ft | 177 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 002 | standard nonelectric | 61 ft | 210 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 003 | standard nonelectric | 63 ft | 269 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 004 | standard nonelectric | 42 ft | 55 ft | 328 ft | $18 |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 005 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | 353 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 006 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | 383 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 007 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 389 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 008 | standard nonelectric | 77 ft | 415 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 009 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 437 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 010 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 428 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 011 | standard nonelectric | 68 ft | 419 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 012 | standard nonelectric | 89 ft | 373 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 013 | standard nonelectric | 69 ft | 346 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 014 | standard nonelectric | 61 ft | 279 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 015 | standard nonelectric | 59 ft | 233 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 016 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | 247 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 017 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | 224 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 018 | standard nonelectric | 73 ft | 242 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 019 | standard nonelectric | 49 ft | 83 ft | 272 ft | $18 |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 020 | standard nonelectric | 75 ft | 239 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 021 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 224 ft | $18 | |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 022 | standard nonelectric | 1 ft | 60 ft | 211 ft | $18 |
| LID CREEK CAMPGROUND | 023 | standard nonelectric | 79 ft | 235 ft | $18 |
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
Lost Johnny Point CampgroundFlathead National Forest · 3.1 mi
Lost Johnny CampgroundFlathead National Forest · 3.2 mi
Doris Creek CampgroundFlathead National Forest · 3.6 mi
Emery Bay CampgroundFlathead National Forest · 3.9 mi
Riverside Campground (MT)Flathead National Forest · 4.2 mi
Murray Bay Campground (MT)Flathead National Forest · 4.5 miLid Creek Campground is located 15 miles south of Hungry Horse, Montana, on the West Side Reservoir Road 895. To find the West Side Reservoir Road, turn off of Highway 2 just past milepost 144. Take the paved West Side Reservoir Road across the Hungry Horse Dam and continue for another 11 miles to the campground.
The West Side Reservoir Road is narrow with many switchbacks. Not suitable for larger RV's. Please use caution.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Martin City, MT
Typical weather
Typical October night 35°F, day 52°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical February night 20°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
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Lid Creek Campground 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 →