Shrine Pass Road Dispersed Camping

Stayed here over Labor Day weekend (arrived Thursday morning). Most of the dispersed camping I’ve done have respectful neighbors. First night another campsite let their dog run free all night. The second hunters camped out with their wildlife calls at all hours of the day and night. But otherwise a nice area, good access to other trails for hiking and biking. A lot of atvs on the road. Road to the campsite was easy enough - gravel with some pot holes and washboards, but by no means “off roading”. We drove a suv.

The dirt road in is ***. It's about 3 miles of washboard, potholes, and ruts, but once here, the camping area is great. It's mostly trucks and vans here, with a few travel trailers. Personally, I would not want to try the road up in a large class A or C, as it is so rough.

At nearly 11,000 feet, August days are comfortable and nights a little chilly even. There are many established looking sites, and a lot of room aside from those. There are 2 vault toilets by the day area parking lot as well.

Your cell service will vary by location, with seemingly the best reception nearer the lot and aforementioned toilets. If you don't need cell/internet, there are some fantastic sites further in where the road narrows. I found a great hidden site behind a couple trees that included a fire ring made of stones that someone had even left a cooking grate behind on. Sadly, I had zero cell service on either Verizon or AT&T at that site, so I had to move to satisfy my interwebz addiction.

Verizon weak signal, but 7.8 Mbps down, 639 Kbps up.
AT&T weak signal, but 9.0 Mbps down, 11 Kbps up (with WeBoost).

Amazing! Almost all the spots are great. We stayed about half way through. Our camp wasn’t the cleaniest but it was tucked in and right near the water. There were several cars passing by but that stopped towards the evening. We did have a drone literally hover above us for about 5 minutes. In the morning a moose passed by our camp. I would love to stay here again. Definitely recommend!

in the jeep the road was easy to drive. a few rocks, and a lot of bumps. it was worth it for a quite nights sleep. on the way up I saw a couple trucks with campers, 1 mini van and a camper van. it's only about 4 miles off the highway and it was very quite minus the 2 cars/trucks that drove by. it's right above the rest stop so you can swing by there before hitting the road again. ATT had service mostly. it was off and on again but mostly on.

While I haven't taken our trailer here, I've been up there many, many times, usually staying at the Shrine Mountain Inn, directly reachable behind the meadow parking area, most often at Jay's Cabin. In the winter that is snowshoeing, in the summer driving. I feel I should clarify a few things -

- This is a very popular winter backcountry area. So it is SEASONAL. The road will not open until the snow melts, which is usually in June. All winter long it is a paradise for skiing, snowshoeing, and snowmobiling. Right after it opens it will be muddy, because that will be what we call Mud Season here. By July it will dry up. The FS may or may not re-grade the road in a given season; if not it will be washboardy. It will close when blocked by snow, probably in November.

- This is just 3 miles from a rest area on I-70. On weekends it will be very busy during the day with looky-loos driving up from the rest area because it is quite pretty. Weekdays will be much more peaceful. It is almost unique in that you do have some cell service through the meadow - most backcountry in Colorado is cell free. Most of these people will not pass the pass so once you leave it you will have a different experience.

- The road all the way through to Red Cliff is a great easy 4x4 drive, and that is what it is. It provides entry to fine 4x4 roads at Lime Creek, Wearyman Creek, and McAllister Gulch. It is not a road for 40' 5th wheelers but short, high clearance trailers should be ok, but I wouldn't take non-rugged vehicles pass the Holy Cross observation pullout, about 4 miles in. There is room there for a small trailer in the trees; maybe room for 3 cars to park. By the way, if global warming hasn't completely eliminated the cross, this is about the only place you can see it (the cross couloir) from any kind of road. 11 miles in you reach pavement back at Red Cliff.

- I will give a plug for the Shrine Mountain Inn. It is just a quarter mile up from the meadow through the gates and is a good entry level place for exploring Colorado backcountry huts. There are 3 huts here; among huts they are unique in having flush toilets and showers and electric lights. You book spots at huts.org. It isn't quite glamping, but is still one of my favorite places to spend a weekend in Colorado. Great place for a group on the 4th of July.

So this is actual backcountry very high up in the Rockies and with that comes some ruggedness. I would not suggest it for anything without any overlanding-high-clearance, but it is quite special if you are so equipped.

I used the Campendium GPS coordinate for the site location I ended up staying at, however I did travel further up the road to look for more sites and it seems like you really have to travel a while to get to some of them (I’m guessing?). I think next time when I’m feeling more adventurous- I’ll go search for some of those awesome overlooks ya’ll have posted photos of! Where I stayed at wasn’t bad either, there were RVs, trailers, vans, and other fellow car campers there - all were quiet and respectful. The site looked moderately clean and I felt pretty safe there as a solo female traveler staying the night. Will definitely be coming there again! Heads up, if you’re driving a low clearance car — you may want to take it slow and drive carefully.

10/7-10/9 - per prior reviews, road is very rough coming up. However, solely due to significant washboarding and not deep ruts and large rocks. Therefore, if you have the patience to drive 2-5mph, and occasionally stop and use your choice of descriptives, you will have no problem accessing the area and enjoying the fantastic views.

We drove to the GPS coordinates in Campendium, and while the meadow sites were beautiful, they didn’t match the pictures. We therefore assumed we needed to go further up the road. Running out of patience with the rough road, we opted to turn around and head back to a spot we saw on the way in which was fantastic (39,32’,27” N, 106,14’, 3” W) and had 360 views. See reference screen shot of altimeter.

We had no issues with our propane fridge or heater. We did have issues sleeping due to altitude, but worth it for the views.

The Shrine Ridge trail is just up the road from where we stayed and is rated 5 stars on AllTrails. Beautiful hike with breathtaking views at the top. Not too difficult as I’m out of shape and not yet acclimated to the altitude. Definitely do it if you have the time (2-3 hours depending on your fitness level). Pit toilets are at the trail head.

Decent cell coverage and with booster 4G LTE Verizon 4 bars.