Spanish Creek 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 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 · 13 notices
In the agency’s own words
Spanish Creek Cabin was constructed in 1934 and retains much of its rustic character from that time. The cabin is available year-round and offers an excellent base camp for a variety of summer and winter recreation opportunities. It is adjacent to a popular trailhead and a campground. Guests may drive to the cabin during summer months. During the winter (December 2nd through May 15th) the access road is gated 3.5 miles from the cabin and guest should be prepared to hike, bike, ski or snowshoe to the cabin. Guests are responsible for their own travel arrangements and safety, and must bring several of their own amenities. Keep reading
Recreation
A nearby trailhead provides access to a network of trails that head south into the Lee Metcalf Wilderness and west into non-wilderness areas.The trails can be used by hikers, equestrians, snowshoers and cross-country skiers. Trails also lead to Little Hell Roaring Creek, the north end of the Madison Range and the South Fork of Spanish Creek. This area also offers opportunities for fishing and hunting.
Facilities
The two-story cabin has bunk beds and beds with mattresses to sleep up to four people. A wood cook stove is provided. In a kitchen area cleaning equipment is available. A campfire ring is located in front of the cabin. An outhouse is equipped with a vault toilet. Electricity and water are not provided. Guests need to bring their own drinking water, bedding, food, lanterns or flashlights, extra toilet paper, dish soap, garbage bags and first aid supplies, among other necessities. The cabin will need to be cleaned and all trash removed before leaving.
Natural Features
The cabin sits at the base of the Lee Metcalf Wilderness, in a large meadow, at an elevation of 6,200 feet. Wildflowers add bursts of color around the cabin each summer. South Fork Spanish Creek flows nearby. The densely-forested peaks of the Madison Range surround the cabin. This area is home to grizzly bears, moose, elk, deer and bighorn sheep, as well as a variety of bird species.
What the agency tells you
The cabin remains locked; a combination lock code will be contained in the reservation confirmation letter/email
Directions and Access: Access to Spanish creek cabin is affected by seasonal road closures. (See below and refer to the Motor Vehicle Use Map) From Bozeman, MT: Drive west towards Four Corners, then south towards Big Sky/West Yellowstone on US Highway 191 for about 19.5 miles. Turn right onto Spanish Creek Road and drive 9 miles to the National Forest boundary. Continue on towards the Spanish Creek Trailhead. To the left (east) side of the road look for a jack leg fence and the access gate for the Spanish Creek Cabin. Use the cabin combination to unlock the gate. Please close the gate behind you. Winter Route, December 2 through May 15: Cabin renters must park 5 miles from US Highway 191 at the Forest Service gate. The Spanish Creek Road FS 982 is closed to wheeled motor vehicles December 2nd - May 15th. (Please refer to the Motor Vehicle Use Map). Do not block any gates. The private landowner must have access beyond gates year-round. Visitors may ski, snowshoe, hike, or bike (depending upon snow conditions) 3.5 miles to cabin, following the directions above. Refunds will not be issued for weather related issues, including weather related accessibility issues. It is your responsibility to think ahead and plan appropriately.
A Stream runs nearby the Cabin; water obtained from nearby natural water sources should be treated prior to use.
Everything else this campground posts · 10
Please be aware; this facility is not cleaned between every user visit. Visitors are advised to clean high-touch surfaces upon arrival and prior to departure. Cleaning supplies will not be provided, so it is recommended that guests bring their own. - Guests should be aware that there is a risk of exposure to hantavirus when visiting remote cabins; click here to learn more
No garbage service; please bring garbage bags and pack out all trash and personal belongings. Do not leave food, oil, tea, coffee, or canned items in the cabin.
Bears frequent the area; guests must carefully follow the food storage order for Custer Gallatin National Forest (Click here for more information)
Provided firewood is for indoor use only for indoor heating and cooking. Cabin users will bring or gather firewood for outdoor use. Provision of firewood is difficult at all times of year and impossible during the winter months. - Burning of Wood Pallets is prohibited. - Campfires must be contained within the fire ring adjacent to the facility; no other campfires are authorized. - 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.
Candles are not permitted inside the cabin.
Federal regulations prohibit firing a gun or use of any other weapon in or within 150 yards of a developed recreation site, across or on a road or body of water, or in any circumstance whereby any person may be injured or property damaged; violators will be prosecuted
Horses are not allowed within 100 yards of cabin. Hay and feed must be certified weed-free
Pets are not recommended; solid pet wastes must be removed within 100 yards of cabin
The area adjacent to Spanish Creek Cabin (behind the locked cabin gate) is occasionally used by an outfitter and guide authorized by the Forest Service; this may include temporary parking of vehicles and horse trailers and the unloading and loading of pack animals
Click here for more information about Custer-Gallatin National Forest
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…cabin. An outhouse is equipped with a vault toilet. Electricity and water are not provided. Guests…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “Guests need to bring their own drinking water, bedding, food, lanterns or flashlights, extra toilet paper, dish soap, garbage bags and first aid supplies, among other necessities.”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Creek, Meadow
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Hunting
- Wildlife viewing
- Winter sports
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 Mon, Oct 19. 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
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.
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 SPANISH CREEK CABIN | 001 | cabin nonelectric | 79 ft | 1,568 ft | $65 |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the phone number
Where it is
Spire Rock CampgroundGallatin National Forest · 8.2 mi
Garnet Mountain Fire LookoutGallatin National Forest · 8.3 miSpire Rock Group CampgroundGallatin National Forest · 8.8 mi
Spire Rock CampgroundGallatin National Forest · 8.8 mi
Greek Creek CampgroundGallatin National Forest · 11 mi
Little Bear CabinGallatin National Forest · 11 miThe weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Big Sky, MT
Typical weather
Typical October night 25°F, day 53°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 9°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
Spanish Creek 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 Spanish Creek Cabin, Gallatin National Forest, Montana
Dear Ryan K. Zinke, I’m a constituent in Montana’s 1st district. I tried to camp at Spanish Creek Cabin, Gallatin National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Spanish Creek 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. Spanish Creek Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Spanish Creek 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 Spanish Creek Cabin (Gallatin 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 Spanish Creek Cabin, Gallatin National Forest, Montana
Dear Steve Daines, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at Spanish Creek Cabin, Gallatin National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Spanish Creek 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. Spanish Creek Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Spanish Creek 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 Spanish Creek Cabin (Gallatin 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 Spanish Creek Cabin, Gallatin National Forest, Montana
Dear Tim Sheehy, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at Spanish Creek Cabin, Gallatin National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Spanish Creek 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. Spanish Creek Cabin keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Spanish Creek 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 Spanish Creek Cabin (Gallatin National Forest, Montana) via campanac.com