Muddy Guard Cabin
1Heads up1 fire 44 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 30 of the next 30 nights read 16:32 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 7 notices
In the agency’s own words
Muddy Guard Cabin dates back to the late 1930s and offers views of wildflower-topped meadows and snow-capped mountains. Originally used as a Forest Service guard station, the quaint cabin appeals to those looking for a peaceful getaway with hiking, horseback riding and fishing. Winter access is possible, but only by cross country skis, snowmobiles or snowshoes along a 200-yard stretch of road. Keep reading
Recreation
Fishing in Muddy Creek is enjoyable and various trails for hiking and mountain biking can be found in the area. Horseback riders appreciate the convenience of keeping horses at the cabin and heading out on surrounding trails.
Facilities
Built by the Civilian Conservation Corps, the cabin is made of peeled logs with saddle corner notching. Outside, a horse corral and hitching post are available. Inside is a kitchen and two bedrooms. One bedroom is furnished with two bunkbeds and the other has a double bed. The kitchen comes with an electric cooking stove, a wood stove for heat, a small refrigerator and a grey water sink. Furniture includes a sofa, dining table and chairs and a dresser. Cleaning supplies, a snow shovel, fire extinguisher, carbon monoxide alarm and fire alarms are also included. No drinking water is available. Guests should bring water, bedding, cooking and eating utensils, trash bags, matches, a first aid kit and firewood.
Natural Features
The cabin is situated in a large open meadow near Muddy Creek at about 7,800 feet elevation. A dense forest of lodgepole pine surrounds the meadow. A short distance northeast lies Crazy Woman Canyon. Moose, deer and elk may be spotted in the area. Summer climates are typically warm days in the 70s and 80s and cool nights.
Nearby Attractions
The town of Buffalo offers conveniences like grocery stores, just a half-hour drive from the cabin.
What the agency tells you
Entry is by combination lock; contact the ranger district at (307) 684-7806 during office hours for combination
No drinking water available
Please bring garbage bags; this is a 'pack it in, pack it out' facility
Everything else this campground posts · 4
Please clean cabin before leaving; cleaning supplies are provided
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
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.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- 1 electric
- Accessible sites
- None listed
Facilities
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…alarm and fire alarms are also included. No drinking water is available. Guests should bring water, bedding,…”
- Firewood
- Mentioned
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Creek, Meadow
- Biking
- Boating
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Horseback riding
- Hunting
- Wildlife viewing
Full this Saturdayread 16:32 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 16:32 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
recreation.gov availability, read 16:32 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.
| MUDDY GUARD | 001 | cabin electric | 50 amp | 451 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
Lost Cabin CampgroundBighorn National Forest · 2.2 mi
Pole Creek CabinBighorn National Forest · 2.8 mi
Sheep Mountain Fire LookoutBighorn National Forest · 5.0 mi
Doyle Creek CampgroundBighorn National Forest · 7.1 mi
South Fork (Wyoming)Bighorn National Forest · 8.5 mi
Tie HackBighorn National Forest · 8.7 miFrom Buffalo, Wyoming, take Wyoming State Highway 16 west 24 miles. Turn left on Crazy Woman Road (FSR 33), travel 400 feet, turn right on Forest Service Road 473. Visitors will use a gate to access the cabin. Please keep the gate closed.
The weather
the next four days
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Buffalo, WY
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
Muddy Guard Cabin 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 →
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 moneyHarriet M. HagemanU.S. Representative · Wyoming, at-large
- Your senator, on the same appropriationCynthia M. LummisU.S. Senator · Wyoming
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJohn BarrassoU.S. Senator · Wyoming
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 Muddy Guard Cabin, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming
Dear Harriet M. Hageman, I’m a constituent in Wyoming, at-large. I tried to camp at Muddy Guard Cabin, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Muddy Guard Cabin 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. Muddy Guard Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Muddy Guard Cabin. 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 Muddy Guard Cabin (Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming) 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 Muddy Guard Cabin, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming
Dear Cynthia M. Lummis, I’m a constituent in Wyoming. I tried to camp at Muddy Guard Cabin, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Muddy Guard Cabin 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. Muddy Guard Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Muddy Guard Cabin. 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 Muddy Guard Cabin (Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming) 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 Muddy Guard Cabin, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming
Dear John Barrasso, I’m a constituent in Wyoming. I tried to camp at Muddy Guard Cabin, Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Muddy Guard Cabin 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. Muddy Guard Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Muddy Guard Cabin. 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 Muddy Guard Cabin (Bighorn National Forest, Wyoming) via campanac.com