It’s not necessary to have it but I would recommend having it to get to a neat place to camp off of the main road. We DO NOT have a 4 wheel drive but my husband is a skilled driver and we were able to make it pretty far, we came about a week ago and the weather was perfect and I’m also adding my images from our April trip just to let you know there is still snow on the ground in April when we went and whenever they have snow fall in the mountains plan to see it here first. The road is narrow so stay alert while driving to maintain a safe adventure. No service so if you need a map I recommend you download it from the pro version of the dyrt ahead of time. Make sure to clean up anything and put your fires completely out.