Schnaus Cabin
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 28 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 · 15 notices
In the agency’s own words
Schnaus Cabin is located near the Wild and Scenic North Fork of the Flathead River, in the Flathead National Forest. It can host up to 12 guests for a scenic, peaceful mountain vacation. The rustic dwelling provides a superb setting for fishing, hiking, bird watching and much more in the Whitefish Mountains. The fully accessible cabin can be reached via vehicle and a parking area is located outside the cabin. Guests are responsible for their own travel arrangements and safety, and must bring several of their own amenities. The majority of the road from Columbia Falls to Schnaus Cabin is gravel, so be prepared for dust during your drive and at the cabin. Keep reading
Recreation
Summertime activities include hiking, rafting and fishing. In winter, visitors enjoy cross country skiing and snowshoeing. Bird and wildlife watching are also pleasing pastimes, and guests may see elk, moose or bears in the area.
Facilities
The cabin is equipped with a propane cook stove, heater, lights, a wood stove and accessible vault toilet. Furnishings include two double beds and a bunk bed on the main floor, plus twin beds located in the loft. No drinking water or electricity is available. Guests should bring plenty of water, bedding, food, flashlights and basic camping gear, among other necessities. Click here for more cabin details.
Natural Features
The cabin sits near a creek and some ponds, a short hike from the North Fork Flathead River. It is surrounded by scattered pine trees and lies within a meadow at an approximate elevation of 3,700 feet, in the Whitefish Range of the Rocky Mountains. The Glacier View Ranger District is bordered on the east by the North Fork of the Flathead River and Glacier National Park. To the north is Canada and west is the Kootenai National Forest.
Nearby Attractions
Polebridge Mercantile is located seven miles south of Schnaus, offering limited supplies.
What the agency tells you
There is a maximum stay of three consecutive nights with a total of seven days per calendar year. Check-out time is 1200 pm. Check-in time is 2 pm.
Grizzly bears frequent the area. Food, garbage and other bear attractants must be stored properly. In most cases this means keeping them inside the cabin or hard-sided vehicle.
To avoid frozen pipes in winter, please use a wash basin for gray water and dump it in the vault toilet.
Everything else this campground posts · 12
Pets and livestock are not allowed at the cabin.
Minor maintenance work may be conducted during cabin rental period; stay away from other buildings on-site.
Please bring garbage bags; this is a 'pack-it-in, pack-it-out' facility.
Firewood is provided for heating purposes only; please replenish cut wood supply prior to departure.
Conserve propane by minimizing use of lights and setting the thermostat at 55 degrees while away from the cabin.
Contact the ranger district office at (406) 387-3800, during business hours (Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.) for updates on weather and road conditions; refunds will not be given for inclement weather or road conditions.
The cabin remains locked; a combination lock code will be contained in the reservation confirmation letter.
Guests must clean cabin prior to departure; a fee will be charged if extra clean-up is needed.
Commercial use of cabin is prohibited.
Firewood is available from October 1st to May 1st. Please do not use provided firewood in the outdoor fire pit.
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.
This is a remote cabin that may be unoccupied for extended periods of time. Mice may be present in cabin - there are supplies to trap mice and remove safely in cabin. Please do your part to help mitigate rodents by picking up food crumbs, cleaning thoroughly, and trapping mice if they are present.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Longest rig
- 50 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…lights, a wood stove and accessible vault toilet. Furnishings include two double beds and a bunk bed…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…plus twin beds located in the loft. No drinking water or electricity is available. Guests should bring…”
Around the campground
- On the water
- River, Creek, Meadow
- Boating
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Wildlife viewing
- Winter sports
- Night sky · 112th darkest of 501 in MT
- Bortle 2
Full this Saturdayread 16:32 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
1 campground has sites open within 30 miles, read Oct 15. See them
OpenBookedClosed
The one site on offer is taken this Friday and 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 · 15
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 · 1
Sites the agency is offering this Friday and Saturday that nobody has taken, nearest first. read Oct 15
- Apgar CampgroundGlacier National Park · 27 mi · 31 of 108 site-nights open
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.
| AREA SCHNAUS CABIN | 001 | cabin nonelectric | 50 ft | 1,128 ft | $65 |
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
Ford CabinFlathead National Forest · 2.8 mi
Wurtz CabinFlathead National Forest · 3.7 mi
Ben Rover CabinFlathead National Forest · 5.6 mi
Bowman Lake CampgroundGlacier National Park · 6.8 mi
Kintla Lake CampgroundGlacier National Park · 6.8 mi
Hornet LookoutFlathead National Forest · 7.8 miFrom Columbia Falls, travel north on Nucleus Avenue and turn east on Railroad Street at the stop sign. This becomes North Fork Road as it travels over the railroad overpass. Continue north on this gravel road for 42 miles to the intersection with Forest Road 10372 and look for the sign for Schnaus Cabin. Go east for less than a half-mile and turn north at the sign for Schnaus Cabin. The majority of the road from Columbia Falls to Scnaus Cabin is gravel, so be prepared for dust during your drive and 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 Polebridge, MT
Typical weather
Typical October night 25°F, day 52°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical February night 12°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
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Schnaus Cabin 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 →
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 moneyRyan K. ZinkeU.S. Representative · Montana’s 1st district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationSteve DainesU.S. Senator · Montana
- Your senator, on the same appropriationTim SheehyU.S. Senator · Montana
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 Schnaus Cabin, Flathead National Forest, Montana
Dear Ryan K. Zinke, I’m a constituent in Montana’s 1st district. I tried to camp at Schnaus Cabin, Flathead National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Schnaus 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Schnaus Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Schnaus 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 Schnaus Cabin (Flathead National Forest, Montana) 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 Schnaus Cabin, Flathead National Forest, Montana
Dear Steve Daines, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at Schnaus Cabin, Flathead National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Schnaus 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Schnaus Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Schnaus 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 Schnaus Cabin (Flathead National Forest, Montana) 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 Schnaus Cabin, Flathead National Forest, Montana
Dear Tim Sheehy, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at Schnaus Cabin, Flathead National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Schnaus 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Schnaus Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Schnaus 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 Schnaus Cabin (Flathead National Forest, Montana) via campanac.com