Agency-listedUSFSFeeOpen today
Spire Rock
Drive-up · U.S. Forest Service · MT · 45.44014, -111.20233
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.
Can I go now? — Spire Rock · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT
Open today Season May 16 – Sep 30. Closes after Sep 30. Weather can shorten it.
U.S. Forest Service record: “5/16-9/30 Weather Dependent.” Read against the calendar on 2026-09-22; with JavaScript your browser re-checks it against today.
Nearest road on the Forest Service MVUM — Spire Rock · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT
No MVUM road within 1 mi of the pin; 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 Spire Rock
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 5,537 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Spire RockNIFC · 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 Spire Rock · 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
- FFuel10 mi
- @Mail10 mi
- GGrocery13 mi
- EVEV fast charger13 mi
- OOutfitter14 mi
- LLaundry14 mi
- HHardware14 mi
- MMechanic16 mi
- +Urgent care17 mi
- RxPharmacy17 mi
- WWater18 mi
- ShShower23 mi
- DDump41 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water's a short hop out, fuel & food sit about 10 mi out.
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 — Spire Rock
Access
Drive-up
Land
U.S. Forest Service
Elevation
5,537 ft
Ground slope
1.4% · flat
State
MT
Coordinates
45.44014, -111.20233
Cost
Fee
Nearby & resupply — around Spire Rock · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureStorm Castle Creek · under 0.1 mi · USGS: perennial stream
- Nearest townGallatin Gateway · ~10.2 mi
- Rail & highwaynone mapped within 10 mi
- Drinking waternone within 10 mi
- FuelFuel · ~10.4 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- GroceriesCountry Market · ~12.7 mi
- PharmacyRosauers Pharmacy · ~16.9 mi
- Hospital / clinicBozeman Health · ~16.6 mi
- HardwareGranite Mountain Countertops · ~14.3 mi
EV charging — from Spire Rock · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger13.4 mi straight-line S — 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 reach9 within 25 mi · 11 within 50 · 25 within 100 · 46 within 150
- Nearest listing CCS16.3 mi — Ressler Cadillac, Bozeman
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO18.8 mi — Audi of Bozeman, Bozeman
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)13.4 mi — L4A1B3 STATIONS TOWN CENTER #2, Big Sky, MT · ChargePoint Network · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: 24 hours daily
- 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 Spire Rock · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- Vault / pit toiletSpire Rock · at this camp · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletLava Lake · ~2.6 mi SW · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletGreek Creek · ~4.2 mi S · USFS
- Vault / pit toiletSwan Creek · ~5.0 mi S · USFS
Coming out here — Spire Rock · Custer Gallatin National Forest · MT
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Storm Castle 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 1.4% — 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 Spire Rock elsewhere
Other camps near Spire Rock
If this one is full, gated or washed out.
- Spire Rock Campground~0.2 mi · fee
- USFS dispersed camp — MT #551~0.6 mi
- Forest Rd 132~0.8 mi
- Forest Rd 132~1.0 mi
The unit that manages Spire Rock
Stay limits, road closures and fire restrictions at Spire Rock 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 Shower Falls at 8,060 ft, about 12 miles away. It sits about 2,523 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 — Spire Rock
Open season
5/16-9/30 Weather Dependent.
Source
U.S. Forest Service recreation data
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
Developed FEE campground (not free) - review | auto:usfs-fee 2026-08-20: US Forest Service developed campground, agency coordinates, agency states a fee. No dollar amount in the agency record -- expect a charge and confirm the current rate before you go. Not field-verified. | Fee 2026-08-23: $26 per night in peak season, single site, and that price includes two driving vehicles; each additional vehicle is $9 per night and Interagency passes do not cover the vehicle fee. The group site is $50. Off season the forest says there is no fee and no amenities. recreation.gov publishes the same $26 and $50 for the 2026 season (May 15 - Sep 26). Source: https://www.fs.usda.gov/r01/custergallatin/recreation/spire-rock-campground and https://www.recreation.gov/camping/campgrounds/233746. WATER (fire 1740, batch 3, tier A): https://www.fs.usda.gov/r01/custergallatin/recreation/spire-rock-campground "Spire Rock Campground" -- "Facility and Amenity Information > Water": "Potable water is not available at this site." (page last updated May 5, 2026; our pin is 0.001 mi from the coordinates that page prints, name match: exact). USFS EDW RecInfra carries no WATER_AVAILABILITY for this site, so it could not corroborate. recreation.gov facility 233746 ("SPIRE ROCK CAMPGROUND") agrees: its amenity list carries 13 items, none of them drinking water. The page's "Seasons of Use" line reads "5/16-9/30 Weather Dependent." -- that is the season of the SITE, not of the tap, so it is not folded into the value.
Season
Read from the agency's own season / closure text in this record (data/conditions.py) and checked against the calendar. The words we read are printed under the verdict at the top of the page.
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 Spire Rock
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.
- Road surface & last-mile access
- 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 — Spire Rock
Water on public land →What “dispersed” means here →Reading a forest MVUM →Gear & rig loadout →All field notes →