West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis)
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- Right now
- Taking bookingsSites offered on 26 of the next 26 nights read 16:32 UTC
- Sites
- 1All of them booked ahead
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 12 notices
In the agency’s own words
West Fork Cabin is a small, secluded cabin in the mountains of southwestern Montana, located high in the Gravelly Range. The cabin was built in 1928 as an intermediate station for patrolling grazing allotments. The area is home to a variety of wildlife and offers numerous trails for hikers, equestrians and off-road vehicle riders during warmer months and snowmobilers in the winter. The cabin is available from July 1 through March 31. It can typically be accessed by vehicle; however, a portion of the roadway may be muddy or snow-covered, requiring four-wheel drive or chains. Keep reading
Beginning around mid-October, snow may make access very difficult. In winter, over snow vehicles are necessary to reach the cabin, but are only permitted after December 1. Guests are responsible for their own travel arrangements and safety, and must bring several of their own amenities. West Fork Cabin is closed on Wednesdays for administrative purposes, July - November.
Recreation
The cabin is popular year-long, especially during hunting season. In early summer, the cabin is an excellent base camp for viewing the spectacular wildflower displays in Eureka Basin and along the Gravelly Range Road. Snowmobile use is permitted after December 1st. Visitors are encouraged to practice safe snowmobiling techniques ( learn more about avalanche danger ). Miles of hiking and horseback riding trails, which wind through the mountains and to the 10,542-foot Black Butte, can be accessed near the cabin. Hellroaring trailhead, just a few miles north of the cabin, leads to the extensive network of trails in the backcountry. Off-road vehicles must stay on designated trails at all times in the area.
Facilities
The primitive, one-room cabin is small and has a set of bunk beds and one twin bed to sleep up to three people. It has a table and chairs, a propane stove and lantern, and a wood stove for heat. Firewood is stacked against the outside fence or within a box on the porch. The cabin is also stocked with basic cookware, dishes, utensils and cleaning equipment. An outhouse with a vault toilet is located about 30 yards south of the cabin at the tree line. It is not visible from the cabin and must be accessed through the gate in the back corner of the fence. Guests may use the large administrative horse pasture, but the take-down fence is usually down and not maintained. Stock is not allowed within the small, rail-fenced area immediately surrounding the cabin. The cabin does not have drinking water or electricity. Fuel is not provided for the stove or lantern, which use the small one gallon diposable bottles. Guests need to bring their own water for drinking, cooking and cleaning. Water taken from the nearby spring box should be filtered or boiled prior to use. Cell phone service may be available a few miles to the north near the Hellroaring trailhead. Items to bring include bedding, pillows, propane fuel canisters, food, flashlights, toilet paper, matches and garbage bags. All garbage and food must be packed out, and guests must clean the cabin and replenish the wood in the woodbox prior to leaving.
Natural Features
The cabin is located on the southern end of the Gravelly Range at an elevation of 8,460 feet at the headwaters of the West Fork Madison River. Much of the area around the cabin was burned in the Eureka Fire in 2013. Black Butte, the highest peak in the range and an old volcanic cone, is about 10 miles to the north and can be easlly climbed. The area is home to some of the highest-elevation pronghorn antelope, as well as other wildlife, such as elk, moose and bears ( learn about bear safety ).
Nearby Attractions
Red Rocks National Wildlife Refuge is a short drive south. Historic Virginia City is nearby to the north and Yellowstone National Park is about 60 miles east
What the agency tells you
The cabin is locked. The combination is made available from the website with your receipt. If you haven't received the combination, you must call the Madison Ranger District at 406-682-4253 Monday - Friday 8:00 am to 4:30 pm for the cabin combination. The office is NOT open on Federal Holidays.
Water and electricity are not available at the cabin
This facility is located in a remote and wild area; before making a reservation, become aware of bear, water and weather safety (including avalanche danger)
Everything else this campground posts · 9
A mandatory food storage order is in effect annually between March 1 and December 1 to ensure all food is properly stored and unavailable to wildlife; please contact the Madison Ranger District for more details
Hay and feed, including grain, must be certified weed-free
All garbage and food must be packed out. Pack it in Pack it out
Guests should be aware that there is a risk of exposure to hantavirus when visiting remote cabins; click here to learn more
Rodent poison may be in use; please take appropriate precautions with children and pets to avoid ingestion
Learn more about the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest
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.
Snowmobiles, or any type of over snow vehicles, are allowed on forest lands only from December 2 through May 15.
There is a 6 day maximum stay rule within a rolling 30 day period. Making additional reservations under the name of another member of the group is nit permissible. The same individuals may not exceed the 6 day limit no matter who's name is on the reservation.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 1 · 1 cabin
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Vault Toilets
- “…cleaning equipment. An outhouse with a vault toilet is located about 30 yards south of the cabin at the…”
- Drinking water
- None, bring your own
- “…surrounding the cabin. The cabin does not have drinking water or electricity. Fuel is not provided for the stove…”
- Firewood
- Mentioned
- Stay limit
- 6 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- River
- Biking
- 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.
Tell me when the season opens
Watch for the season to open
One email when the season goes on sale, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We check once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time the agency has that season on sale.
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 · 14
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.
| AREA WEST FORK CABIN | 001 | cabin nonelectric | 248 ft | $45 |
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
Black Butte CabinBeaverhead National Forest · 8.5 miCottonwood CampgroundBeaverhead National Forest · 12 mi
Notch CabinBeaverhead National Forest · 13 mi
Vigilante CabinBeaverhead National Forest · 15 miEast Fork Blacktail Deer Creek WsaDillon Field Office · 16 mi
Wade Lake (MT)Beaverhead National Forest · 16 miFrom Ennis, travel south on Highway 287 for about 30 miles, then head northwest on Standard Creek Road for about 20 miles and 10 miles south on Forest Road 290. The majority of the road to the cabin is gravel and has some long, steep grades, which may require four-wheel drive. The road can be treacherous and impassable if the conditions are wet or snowy, often in mid-October and November. Over snow vehicles are necessary in winter, permissable after December 1. All roads in the Gravelly Range are closed to wheeled motorized use from April 1 through June 30. Maps (Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest-South) may be purchased by calling the Madison Ranger District.
The weather
the next four days
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Lakeview, MT
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
West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) 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 West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis), Beaverhead National Forest, Montana
Dear Ryan K. Zinke, I’m a constituent in Montana’s 1st district. I tried to camp at West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis), Beaverhead National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) 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. West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis). 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 West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) (Beaverhead 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 West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis), Beaverhead National Forest, Montana
Dear Steve Daines, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis), Beaverhead National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) 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. West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis). 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 West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) (Beaverhead 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 West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis), Beaverhead National Forest, Montana
Dear Tim Sheehy, I’m a constituent in Montana. I tried to camp at West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis), Beaverhead National Forest, Montana, and couldn’t. All 1 sites at West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) 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. West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) keeps none, and that’s a choice somebody made rather than a rule. I’m not asking you to run West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis). 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 West Fork Cabin (S of Ennis) (Beaverhead National Forest, Montana) via campanac.com