Red Canyon Creek Dispersed Camping

Spent a week exploring the West Yellowstone area of Montana and stayed here three nights. The creek was thirty paces from camp and was delightful. Not a lot of annoying bugs to contend with in mid August. Saw lots of wildflowers and butterflies. Peaceful weekend. Would stay again.

I parked ~2.4 miles in from the main road. Right side, next to the creek. Tip: tents, vehicles and fires must be 30ft+ away from the creek.

Note: another reviewer lists this as closed. It is not closed. Yes, there is a logging activity sign but I saw others coming up for day-use and overnight.

Great spot with several tent camping areas and a few spots large enough to accommodate an RV or travel trailer. We have a 33ft travel trailer and had no problem with the spot at the end of the road in the culdesac. There was also another site next to us big enough for any size rig. I counted at least 10 tent camping areas along this road and about 5 for an RV depending on size (4 sites would have worked for our rig size). Very cool creek and hiking area right next to our site. It was opening day for bow hunting AND Labor Day weekend so we met several friendly, local hunters and felt completely comfortable in this area. We did not see any wildlife, though. We did hike the trail and it was marvelous! PLEASE take bear spray. The ONLY downfall to this dry camping scenario was the road coming in. It’s dirt/gravel and rough in some areas so go slowly and check for things moving around in your rig before you let any slides out. We were able to use our generator without disturbing anyone, and everyone (hikers, hunters, dirt bikers) was friendly!

This site was about 10-15 minutes to the West entrance of Yellowstone, depending on traffic. It was super quiet here and the stars were bright and highly visible. Our kids (boys, 6 and 8) LOVED this site.

Cell reception for Verizon NOT good enough for full internet browsing, but you can call/text with no problem.

Red Canyon Rd is approximately 12 miles from West Yellowstone Montana. The road in was in good shape only a couple of small ruts. If it were raining I could see the road getting bad. We stayed in what I call site #3. It is also the trail head for the Hebgen Trail so we had a little more traffic than some of the other sites. There are a total of 5 sites with 3 being on the water (ours was not). Site 5 is at the dead end and there is a circle drive so very easy to turn around. From pavement to end of road is about 5 miles.