Sunshine Guard Station
2Heads up2 fires, nearest 10 mi
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 16:17 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 14 notices
In the agency’s own words
Sunshine Guard Station is situated along John Day River in the Malheur National Forest at an elevation of 3,700 feet, about 43 miles northeast of John Day, Oregon. The former guard station was built in 1936 and until the 1990s was used alternatively as a bunkhouse or a work station for fireguards. The guard station can be accessed by vehicle. Guests are responsible for their own travel arrangements and safety, and must bring several of their own amenities. Keep reading
Recreation
Recreational options include fishing for steelhead and rainbow trout in the John Day River. Restrictions apply; visitors should refer to Oregon State regulations. There are hiking trails and back roads to the north of the guard station that lead into the nearby Vinegar Hill / Indian Rock Scenic Area. Wildlife viewing is popular, as is scenic driving.
Facilities
This rustic four-room cabin sleeps up to six and has a kitchen, living room, and two bedrooms. The living room is furnished with a futon, two chairs, a coffee table and an end table. The larger bedroom is furnished with a queen-sized bed and a closet, while the smaller bedroom offers a queen-sized bed and a chair. The kitchen is furnished with a table and four chairs, electric refrigerator, and stove. Electric heat and lights are provided, and a vault toilet is located next to the cabin. There is no water in the cabin. Guests must bring their own water for drinking, cooking and washing. Roads to the guard station are paved and maintained for summer and winter access. No pets allowed in the Guard Station.
Natural Features
The guard station has a view of the Middle Fork of the John Day River. The Vinegar Hill Forest/Indian Rock Scenic Area is nearby. The 25,000-acre area includes a 10 mile ridgeline that comprises the summit of the Greenhorn Range in the Blue Mountains of eastern Oregon. Outcrops of serpentine, rhyolite, basalt, granite, and shale can be seen. Agates can also be found on some of the rocky slopes. Wildlife includes elk and deer, songbirds and, in the river, steelhead and trout. Nearly every type of alpine wildflower found west of the Rockies can be blooming at different times in this area. Magone Lake is about 20 miles west of the guard station. Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (541) 575-3000.
What the agency tells you
Please contact the Malheur National Forest Recreation department before arriving at the cabin rental to check on any restrictions or conditions, such as fire or road closures, weather or storms.
County Road 20 along the Middle Fork John Day River, accessing Sunshine Guard Station, receives limited winter maintenance. On occasion the road may be closed or entirely inaccessible. Also, there are no services along the Middle Fork of the John Day River should you need assistance. Please be sure to contact the Blue Mountain Ranger District at 541-575-3000 prior to visiting the Guard Station to check conditions. Be prepared and self-sufficient when traveling on the Malheur National Forest and travel at your own risk.
Sunshine Guard Station is in a remote forest location with no mobile phone coverage.
Everything else this campground posts · 11
The cabin does not have water; guests must bring their own water for drinking, cooking, and washing.
Guests must bring bedding, pillows, and/or sleeping bags as well as a flashlight or lantern for emergencies, first aid kit, washcloths and towels and dish soap.
Guests must bring trash bags and pack out their own trash.
Guests must clean the cabin before their departure.
The Middle Fork of the John Day River can be seasonally "buggy", including box-elder bugs and houseflies. Recreation staff (and guests) do their best to keep the facility clean and to prevent insects from entering. We also provide a vacuum cleaner for use by guests. Nonetheless, you may encounter insects within the guard station. We apologize for the inconvenience, and if the situation warrants recreation staff attention, please call 541-820-3800 and we will do our best to address the issue.
Entry to the cabin is by combination lock; the combination to the guard station will be in your confirmation letter.
Most of the area around the cabin is closed to snowmobiles, except on open roads, to protect winter range for elk and deer.
This is bear country; food should be stored properly; learn more about bear and other safety precautions
Don't Move Firewood: Please protect Pacific Northwest forests by preventing the spread of invasive species. Firewood can carry insects and diseases that can threaten the health of our western forests. You can make a difference by obtaining and burning your firewood near your camping destination. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.
Learn more about the The Malheur National Forest
No pets
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- 1 electric
- Longest rig
- 30 ft
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Not allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- VAULT TOILETS on 1 of 1 campsite records
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…toilet is located next to the cabin. There is no water in the cabin. Guests must bring their own water for…”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River
- Biking
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Hunting
- Night sky · 70th darkest of 770 in OR
- Bortle 2
Full this Saturdayread 16:17 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
1 campground has sites open within 30 miles, read 16:31 UTC. See them
OpenBooked
The one site on offer is taken this Saturday. 1 is free on Tue, Oct 20. read 16:17 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 · 1
Sites the agency is offering this Friday and Saturday that nobody has taken, nearest first. read 16:31 UTC
- Magone LakeMalheur National Forest · 13 mi · 1 of 4 site-nights open
recreation.gov availability, read 16:17 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.
| LOOP A | 001 | cabin electric | 30 ft | 99 ft | $60 |
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
Middle Fork CampgroundMalheur National Forest · 5.3 miHead O' Boulder Forest CampMalheur National Forest · 6.2 miDeerhorn CampgroundMalheur National Forest · 6.6 mi
Olive Lake Campground (OR)Umatilla National Forest · 9.6 miDixie CampgroundMalheur National Forest · 11 miFrom Prairie City, OR., travel east on US Highway 26 approximately 13 miles to the junction of US Highway 7. Turn left on US Highway 7, travel one mile to the junction with County Road 20/ Middle Fork Road. Turn left and follow County Road 20 approximately 13 miles, the guard station will be on the right.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Greenhorn, OR
Typical weather
Typical October night 28°F, day 59°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 15°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
Sunshine Guard Station is in Oregon’s 2nd congressional district. Its representative, Cliff Bentz (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 moneyCliff BentzU.S. Representative · Oregon’s 2nd district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJeff MerkleyU.S. Senator · Oregon
- Your senator, on the same appropriationRon WydenU.S. Senator · Oregon
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 Sunshine Guard Station, Malheur National Forest, Oregon
Dear Cliff Bentz, I’m a constituent in Oregon’s 2nd district. I tried to camp at Sunshine Guard Station, Malheur National Forest, Oregon, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Sunshine 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. Sunshine Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Sunshine 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 Sunshine Guard Station (Malheur National Forest, Oregon) 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 Sunshine Guard Station, Malheur National Forest, Oregon
Dear Jeff Merkley, I’m a constituent in Oregon. I tried to camp at Sunshine Guard Station, Malheur National Forest, Oregon, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Sunshine 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. Sunshine Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Sunshine 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 Sunshine Guard Station (Malheur National Forest, Oregon) 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 Sunshine Guard Station, Malheur National Forest, Oregon
Dear Ron Wyden, I’m a constituent in Oregon. I tried to camp at Sunshine Guard Station, Malheur National Forest, Oregon, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Sunshine 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. Sunshine Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Sunshine 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 Sunshine Guard Station (Malheur National Forest, Oregon) via campanac.com