Agency-listedUSFSFeeRoad season: open (MVUM)
Basin Campground
Drive-up · U.S. Forest Service · MT · 45.16291, -109.39184
Ask an AI about this campsiteOpens Grok already loaded with this site. It reads the same records this page is built from, and links whatever it tells you.
Ask about this camp →U.S. Forest Service lists this as a developed campground. Expect marked sites, a fee station or a reservation, and the usual campground rules. The dispersed-camping freedom of the surrounding forest does not apply inside it. What changes is conditions — roads, gates, closures, fire rules. Check those with the unit before you commit to the drive.
Nearest road on the Forest Service MVUM — Basin Campground · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT
The nearest road on the Forest Service MVUM is FR 2071C (Basin Creek Campground), 160 ft from the pin. The MVUM lists it as bituminous surface treatment surface and maintenance level 4 – moderate degree of user comfort.
Road season: open (MVUM) The MVUM lists FR 2071C (Basin Creek Campground), 160 ft from the pin, open to passenger vehicles May 15 – Sep 30. That season ends after Sep 30.
MVUM record for FR 2071C (Basin Creek Campground): “05/15-09/30” Read against the calendar on 2026-09-27; with JavaScript your browser re-checks it against today.
From the Forest Service's own Motor Vehicle Use Map roads layer (EDW, Clearinghouse refresh Aug 30, 2026), straight-line from the pin to the nearest mapped segment. The nearest segment is not necessarily the way in, a maintenance level is the agency's class and not a report on today, and a road's season is the road's — it is not a campground order. What the levels mean → What an MVUM is →
What the record says about the site — Basin Campground · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT
- Tent camping
- Trailers and RVs fit
From the OpenStreetMap contributors listing for this site — their words, not our visit. Records go stale; treat it as a starting point and confirm anything your trip depends on.
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Basin Campground
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 6,907 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Basin CampgroundNIFC · AirNow
Checking active fires & air quality…
Active wildfires from NIFC (within ~50 mi); air quality from AirNow. Always confirm current fire restrictions with the managing office before you go.
Everything you need — measured from Basin Campground · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- WWater3 mi
- FFuel7 mi
- GGrocery7 mi
- @Mail7 mi
- HHardware7 mi
- MMechanic7 mi
- OOutfitter7 mi
- +Urgent care25 mi
- DDump42 mi
- LLaundry46 mi
- EVEV fast charger46 mi
- RxPharmacy47 mi
- ShShower47 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water is basically at camp, fuel & food sit about 7 mi out, the nearest EV fast charger is a 46-mi run (and back).
Not within 60 mi: Propane. Plan those before you head up.
One dot per need — the nearest of each kind, straight-line from camp. Places from OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors); the EV fast charger from the US DOE station locator. Open in Google Maps ↗
The site — Basin Campground
Access
Drive-up
Land
U.S. Forest Service
Elevation
6,907 ft
Ground slope
1.8% · flat
State
MT
Coordinates
45.16291, -109.39184
Cost
Fee
Nearby & resupply — around Basin Campground · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureWest Fork Rock Creek · under 0.1 mi · USGS: perennial stream
- Also mapped (OSM)Wild Bill Lake (water) · mapped within 1.6 mi
- Nearest townRed Lodge · ~7.2 mi
- Rail & highwaynone mapped within 10 mi
- Drinking waterDrinking water · ~2.6 mi
- FuelFuel · ~7.3 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- GroceriesBeartooth IGA · ~7.2 mi
- Hospital / clinicBeartooth Billings Clinic · ~8.0 mi
EV charging — from Basin Campground · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger46.3 mi straight-line NE — Laurel, MT - Tesla Supercharger (at a hotel) · Tesla · NACS (Tesla) · 8 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-06-18 · hours: 24 hours daily. NACS partner enabled. · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reachnone within 25 mi · 2 within 50 · 20 within 100 · 30 within 150
- Nearest listing CCS47.0 mi — DENNY MENHOLT CHEVROLET BUICK GMC, CODY
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO54.7 mi — Denny Menholt Nissan, Billings
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)46.8 mi — Buffalo Bill Center of the West, Cody, WY (at a museum) · Non-Networked · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2023-03-08 · hours: 24 hours daily
- Also listed, not counted aboveNACS-only Level 2 — City of Red Lodge - Tesla Destination, Red Lodge, 7.3 mi · NACS (Tesla) · hours: 24 hours daily. Open to Teslas only. · AFDC lists it “Free”
Level 2, restricted access — Super 8 by Wyndham - Cooke City, Cooke City, 28.1 mi · J1772 · hours: 24 hours daily; for guest use only; see front desk for access · AFDC lists it “Free” - Pricing at the fast chargernot listed
- Power (kW)not listed by AFDC — “DC fast” spans roughly 24 to 350 kW, so ask the network.
- Read this honestlyStraight-line miles, like every distance on this site. Roads run longer than this, and you have to get back. We know where a charger is listed. We don’t know if it works today, how fast it is, or the road miles. Check the network before you commit.
Snapshot 2026-09-16 · AFDC record 303733 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Basin Campground · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- RestroomBasin · at this camp · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletBasin · ~0.3 mi SE · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletWild Bill Lake · ~1.3 mi SE · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletSilver Run Trailhead · ~2.5 mi E · USFS
Coming out here — Basin Campground · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps West Fork Rock Creek as a perennial stream, under 0.1 mi from the pin (National Hydrography Dataset, data refreshed October 2022). Mapped as perennial is not the same as flowing today. Nobody has checked it for you. Filter or boil anything you drink.
- Ground slope around the pin: about 1.8% — flat. Measured on USGS's 3DEP elevation model (1 m data here), sampled every 10 metres around the point. That is the hillside, not the ground under your wheels — a graded pullout or a bench a few metres across is too small to show up at that spacing, and nobody has checked this one for you.
- The game's day in this forest These lines are for the whole Custer Gallatin National Forest, not for this camp's own spot: a fire restriction is posted by county, and a forecast is for one point in the forest. A camp's own night can differ from that point, most in the mountains. Read when this page loads from the same daily files the game uses; every line says where it came from and when it was read.
- This camp's own spot: sun and fire record Worked out for this camp's recorded point from federal records, not for the whole forest. Every line says where it came from and when.
Sun behind the west ridge: (USGS 3DEP elevation, bare ground, 30-meter steps, finer close to camp; trees not counted; worked out October 15, 2026 for the 15th of each month, in this forest's clock; nobody has stood on it for this.)
- No rail line and no interstate or US route is mapped within 10 mi of the pin. Checked against the FRA/BTS North American Rail Network (data updated Jul 21, 2026) and the Census's TIGER/Line primary roads (TIGER/Line 2025, released Oct 2025). Both are national files and both are maps of what is built, not counts of what moves on it.
- Power: Dave carries his own — batteries or solar. A generator will run your rig and it is also the thing everybody camped near you can hear.
- Getting online: Dave recommends Starlink. He has had it since SpaceX introduced it, used it for four years living on the road, and it delivers as promised — several hundred nights out, and he can count on one hand the places he could not connect. The cable on his unit runs 150 feet, which is usually all it takes to find enough sky. Starlink → Referral link — Starlink pays Dave $100 in cash if you sign up through it, and that money funds this site and the next trip. It costs you nothing and does not change the recommendation.
Open Basin Campground elsewhere
Other camps near Basin Campground
If this one is full, gated or washed out.
- USFS dispersed camp — MT #396~0.2 mi
- USFS dispersed camp — MT #470~0.3 mi
- Dispersed camp #6 — Carbon County, MT~0.9 mi
- USFS dispersed camp — MT #606~1.0 mi
The unit that manages Basin Campground
Stay limits, road closures and fire restrictions at Basin Campground are set by Custer Gallatin National Forest, not by the campsite — check there before you go.
Snow, and when this opens
The nearest automatic snow station is Cole Creek at 7,910 ft, about 3 miles away. It sits about 1,003 ft higher than this camp, so treat it as a guide rather than a reading for this spot. We do not repeat a depth here, because any number we stored would be stale by the time you read it — the station publishes today's.
How we know this — Basin Campground
Source
OpenStreetMap contributors
Confidence
Likely — The record is good enough to put a pin on, but thin in places. Treat the details as a starting point, not gospel.
How it was placed
auto: drive (road/trail right there) | Fee 2026-09-28: $20 per night for a single site, which includes one driving vehicle, plus $10 for each additional vehicle and a $6 day-use fee for stays over half an hour; half price for Interagency Senior and Access pass holders. recreation.gov publishes the same $20 for a standard site in the 2026 peak season (May 22 - Sep 10), and $20 for walk-in use either side of it through Sep 30. Firewood is sold at $7 a bundle. Source: https://www.fs.usda.gov/r01/custergallatin/recreation/basin-campground and https://www.recreation.gov/camping/campgrounds/232770.
Site details
The OpenStreetMap contributors listing's own fields for this site (site type, whether tents or trailers fit, capacity, toilet, water, campfires, reservations). Printed as the record states them, unchecked by us, and never used to make a cost claim -- the cost verdict above is decided separately and audited before every deploy.
Nearest MVUM road
US Forest Service Motor Vehicle Use Map roads layer (EDW_MVUM_01, layer 1), Clearinghouse refresh Aug 30, 2026. Straight-line distance from the pin to the nearest mapped segment within 1 mi; surface type, maintenance level and open dates are the agency's own values for that segment, expanded from its codes and otherwise unedited. Nothing here says which road reaches the site.
EV chargers
US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center station locator, snapshot 2026-09-16. Straight-line miles to the nearest public, open, unrestricted station; restricted and planned units are shown but never counted.
Field check
On the agency's books. The land manager inventoried this site, so its existence is not in question — current conditions are. Nobody from here has camped it recently.
What we don’t know about Basin Campground
A land record can put you within a few meters of a spot. It cannot tell you any of this — so check it yourself, and treat anything below as the open question it is.
- Whether that MVUM road is the way in, and the last stretch beyond it
- Whether the site itself closes on its own schedule — only the road's season is on record
- How many rigs actually fit
- Cell coverage by carrier
- Current fire restrictions
- Whether any water here is drinkable
- Shade & wind exposure
- Noise and who else shows up
- Whether a listed EV charger works today, or the road miles to it
Before you go — Basin Campground
Winter vs summer roads →Finding water out here →What “dispersed” means here →First-night troubleshooting →All field notes →