★ Field-verified · Dave's ownUSFSFree
Madison County
Drive-up · U.S. Forest Service · Madison County, MT · 45.47744, -112.06840
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 →Dave's been here. A spot from Dave's own travels on U.S. Forest Service land — free to camp. Conditions still change, so confirm access, stay limits and fire rules before you go.
A free campground in the National Forest east of Sheridan, Montana. The campground was okay, featuring vault toilets, fire rings, and picnic tables. The surrounding forest was amazing, with historical mining ruins and dramatic cliffs and rock faces. Close to Sheridan which is charming Montana town. Poor cell service. Enough room for one or two vehicles per site. There are a lot of other camping opportunities along this road, ripe for exploration. Strongly recommended.
A night on record
Dave slept here on 10 October 2018. No agency publishes a season for this site, so that night is the only season evidence we have — what the site was then, not a forecast for this year.
Nearest road on the Forest Service MVUM — Madison County · Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest · MT
No road within 1 mi of the pin in the national MVUM layer — and that layer carries no data at all for this forest (unit 0102), so this is the layer's silence, not the ground's. Access may be a county road or unmapped.
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 →
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Madison County
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 6,507 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Madison CountyNIFC · 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 Madison County · Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest · MT
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- FFuel6 mi
- GGrocery6 mi
- @Mail6 mi
- OOutfitter7 mi
- LLaundry18 mi
- ShShower26 mi
- DDump26 mi
- MMechanic27 mi
- EVEV fast charger40 mi
- +Urgent care40 mi
- RxPharmacy41 mi
- WWater41 mi
- HHardware41 mi
- AAir-up41 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water is a real 41-mi drive, fuel & food sit about 6 mi out, the nearest EV fast charger is a 40-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 — Madison County
Access
Drive-up
Land
U.S. Forest Service
Elevation
6,507 ft
Ground slope
2.6% · flat
County
Madison County, MT
Coordinates
45.47744, -112.06840
Cost
Free
Nearby & resupply — around Madison County · Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest · MT (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureMill Creek · ~0.1 mi · USGS: perennial stream
- Nearest townBrandon · ~3.3 mi
- Rail & highwaynone mapped within 10 mi
- Drinking waternone within 10 mi
- FuelMcCleod Mercantile · ~6.4 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- Dump station~26.1 mi
- GroceriesIGA · ~6.4 mi
From the field — what Dave saw, in person
Cell service
No signal
Getting there
Any vehicle managed it
Fire ring
Yes
Toilet on site
Yes
Tent friendly
Yes
Verdict
Highly recommended
EV charging — from Madison County · Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest · MT — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger39.9 mi straight-line E — Big Sky, MT - Tesla Supercharger (at a shopping center) · Tesla · NACS (Tesla) · 8 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-06-18 · hours: 24 hours daily. Open to Teslas only. · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reachnone within 25 mi · 7 within 50 · 23 within 100 · 43 within 150
- Nearest listing CCS45.0 mi — Flying J Town Pump (Butte, MT), Butte
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO53.4 mi — Audi of Bozeman, Bozeman
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)14.0 mi — Virginia City Central Parking Lot (at a parking lot) · Non-Networked · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-05-12 · hours: 24 hours daily
- Also listed, not counted aboveLevel 2, restricted access — Norris Hot Springs, Norris, 19.7 mi · J1772 · hours: 24 hours daily; turned off during the Winter months
- 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 163999 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Madison County · Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest · MT — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- Vault / pit toiletMill Creek Campground · at this camp · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletBranham Lakes Campground · ~4.7 mi NE · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletPotosi Campground · ~10.2 mi NE · USFS
- Highway rest areaTwin Bridges · ~13.7 mi W
Coming out here — Madison County · Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest · MT
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Mill Creek as a perennial stream, ~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 2.6% — 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.
- 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 Madison County elsewhere
Other camps near Madison County
If this one is full, gated or washed out.
- Forest Rd 159~2.5 mi
- Balanced Rock Campground~2.6 mi
- Forest Rd 159~2.6 mi
- Forest Rd 158~3.0 mi
The unit that manages Madison County
Stay limits, road closures and fire restrictions at Madison County are set by Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest, not by the campsite — check there before you go.
Snow, and when this opens
The nearest automatic snow station is Lower Twin at 7,920 ft, about 7 miles away. It sits about 1,413 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 — Madison County
Source
Dave's own travels
Confidence
Researched — The record is detailed and internally consistent, and the coordinates land where the managing agency says this site is.
How it was placed
FIELD VERIFIED by Dave Lalande -- he has stood on this site. Coordinates are his own GPX track point, not a geocode. County and state confirmed against the FCC Census Block API (Madison County, MT). Everything under 'From the field' is a direct observation; nothing here is inferred from a land record.
A night on record
Dave's own GPS diary, 2017–2020: the date of the waypoint he saved here. The timestamp is UTC, so an entry saved in the evening carries the next morning's date. An observation of one night, never a forecast.
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
Verified on the ground. Dave has stood on this one. He camped here on 10 October 2018. Conditions still change — confirm before you commit.
What we don’t know about Madison County
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.
- How many rigs actually fit
- Seasonal & winter access
- 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 — Madison County
Winter vs summer roads →Water on public land →What “dispersed” means here →How to read this page →All field notes →