Upper Crossing Guard Station
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 16:37 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
Upper Crossing Guard Station is located at an elevation of 8,400 feet, along a scenic byway near the Continental Divide, offering visitors a comfortable lodging experience in a remote setting in Rio Grande National Forest. This guard station is the original headquarters of the old Cochetopa National Forest that existed for only a few years during the early part of the last century. Today, guests to the guard station will find plenty of opportunities for relaxation and recreation in south central Colorado. Keep reading
Recreation
The area offers many opportunities for hiking in summer, hunting in the fall and cross country skiing and snowmobiling in the winter. The cabin sits at the confluence of two creeks and offers visitors excellent fishing for rainbow, cutthroat, brown and brook trout right out the front door. Hiking opportunities are in close proximity to the cabin, extending out to nearby wilderness and other public lands.
Facilities
Upper Crossing Guard Station has all the amenities of a standard home, including electricity, heat and inside running water. It is furnished with three bunk beds, with twin beds on the top and fold-out full beds on the bottom, accommodating up to nine people. The cabin has electric lights, propane heater and wood burning stove. The living area has a table and chairs, couch and other furniture. The kitchen is equipped with a refrigerator, stove, hot water, some cooking utensils and some pots and pans. A picnic table, campfire grill and horseshoe pit are also on-site. Although the cabin has most amenities, guests do need to provide their own food, sleeping bags, linens, towels, dish soap, matches, cooking gear, first aid kit, toilet paper and garbage bags. It is recommended that guests bring an additional light source in case of emergencies.
Natural Features
Upper Crossing Guard Station provides a remote setting that is easily accessible year-round via CO Highway 114. The brief dirt road leading to the cabin is actually the old stagecoach route, complete with historic graffiti that served as billboards advertising goods and services at the stagecoach stops. Views from the cabin include portions of the Continental Divide and unspoiled surrounding countryside, showcasing high mountain peaks, diverse forests, streams and lakes in addition to some of Colorado's most scenic working ranches. Historically, Ute Indians traveled through this area and found it favorable for living in the San Luis Valley.
What the agency tells you
Please contact the Saguache Ranger District prior to arriving at the cabin to check on any restrictions or conditions, such as fire or road closures, weather or storms that may affect the quality of your visit.
Public access is only allowed via the directions indicated in the 'Getting There' section below. The road to the south of the Guard Station gate crosses private property and is not open to the public for access to Highway 114.
Monthly water testing is required, and samples are taken from the bathroom sink. Expect a Forest Employee, near the beginning of the month, to take approximately 20 minutes to allow for sampling.
Everything else this campground posts · 12
All garbage and food must be packed out; do not burn garbage in the fire pit.
Entry to the cabin is by combination lock, which will be provided in the confirmation letter or email which is sent after a reservation is made. The keypad on the door may have multiple digits per button. The button needs to only be pressed once regardless of the assigned code, before entering the next number.
The guard station is a non-smoking facility.
The maximum stay limit on the forest is 14 days. You may be visited by a Forest Employee during your stay, for routine cabin safety check and maintenance/cleaning. If you wish to not be disturbed, a door tab will be available to use.
Pets are allowed at the facility, but must be under control at all times; they must not harass wildlife or livestock. Pets are not allowed on the furniture, including bed, couches, and chairs. Pet hair is difficult to remove and can cause allergic reactions. Be considerate of others.
Livestock are prohibited: including horses, mules, llamas, and alpacas.
All cabins are administratively used on occasion. You may encounter agency stock horses during your stay. Do not pet, feed or try to ride the animals.
Do not leave food or trash outside the guard station; there are bears in the area.
Please clean the guard station before leaving and ensure the gate is locked upon departure.
Drink plenty of water before arrival and during your stay to avoid altitude sickness.
For safety and resource protection, do not discharge firearms and skeet shooting is prohibited within 150 yards of the cabin area boundary.
During the winter you may need to snowmobile, snowshoe or ski to access the cabin.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- 1 electric
- Accessible sites
- 1
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Yes, the record doesn't say what kind
- Toilet on all 1 of this campground's campsite records
- Showers
- Yes, the record doesn’t say what kind
- Shower/Bath Type states a shower on all 1 of this campground's campsite records
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, Creek
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Historic site
- Hunting
- Wildlife viewing
- Winter sports
Full this Saturdayread 16:37 UTC
How full the weekend is nationally.
OpenBooked
The one site on offer is taken this Friday and Saturday. 1 is free on Mon, Oct 19. read 16:37 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 16:37 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.
| UPPER CROSSING GUARD STATION | UCGS01 | cabin electric | yes | 308 ft | $75 |
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
Carnero Guard StationRio Grande National Forest · 11 mi
Storm King CampgroundRio Grande National Forest · 13 mi
Stone Cellar Guard StationRio Grande National Forest · 15 miNeedle Creek Reservoir Camping AreaGunnison National Forest · 16 mi
Poso CampgroundRio Grande National Forest · 16 miAccess to the cabin is only allowed via the route described in this section. The road that leads to the south of the Guard Station gate crosses private property and is not open for public access to Highway 114.
From Saguache, take Highway 114 west for approximately 22 miles. The turnoff for the Guard Station is 1 mile past County Road NN14. From Gunnison, remain on Highway 114 until approximately 4 miles past the Buffalo Pass Campground entrance. The exit to the station is between mile marker 39 and 40. Look for the Upper Crossing sign on the highway. Turn east for a short distance until the road ends in a "T" Turn right and go .5 mile. The cabin will be on the left.
During the winter guests may need to snowmobile, snow shoe or ski .5 miles from the nearest maintained road in order to access the cabin.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Saguache, CO
Typical weather
Typical October night 30°F, day 62°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 7°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
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
Upper Crossing Guard Station is in Colorado’s 3rd congressional district. Its representative, Jeff Hurd (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 moneyJeff HurdU.S. Representative · Colorado’s 3rd district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJohn W. HickenlooperU.S. Senator · Colorado
- Your senator, on the same appropriationMichael F. BennetU.S. Senator · Colorado
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 Upper Crossing Guard Station, San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado
Dear Jeff Hurd, I’m a constituent in Colorado’s 3rd district. I tried to camp at Upper Crossing Guard Station, San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Upper Crossing 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Upper Crossing Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Upper Crossing 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 Upper Crossing Guard Station (San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado) 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 Upper Crossing Guard Station, San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado
Dear John W. Hickenlooper, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Upper Crossing Guard Station, San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Upper Crossing 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Upper Crossing Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Upper Crossing 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 Upper Crossing Guard Station (San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado) 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 Upper Crossing Guard Station, San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado
Dear Michael F. Bennet, I’m a constituent in Colorado. I tried to camp at Upper Crossing Guard Station, San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at Upper Crossing 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 7,639 federal campgrounds in this country still keep at least some sites for whoever arrives first. Upper Crossing Guard Station keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run Upper Crossing 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 Upper Crossing Guard Station (San Luis Valley Field Office, Colorado) via campanac.com