Best Tent Camping near Moorcroft, WY

Pros: most of the spots have some shade and an awesome cement picnic table. They’re also spaced far enough apart that each one has privacy. Pat’s point has a nice trail where you can sit and watch the sunset. During the week things are quiet.

Cons: while the showers were nice, 2 of the 4 were locked the entire week. The change machine was consistently out of order. No one kept their dogs on leashes despite the posted signs. Our first night a couple had a loud, drunken argument, ending with the wife telling her child (maybe 7) to F*** off. The camp host didn’t really do anything about noise or when cars were parked blocking the road.

I camped here for two days recently with my wife in a 26 foot travel trailer.  We entered the campground around 10 am and were able to quickly find a nice spot at the outer perimeter of the campground with a view.  This was campsite B7.  It was level, with a fire ring, free wood, clean aluminum picnic table and maybe 150 feet from the clean and well-maintained restroom with flush toilets.  Water is available from nearby spigots.  There are lots of trees and the campground hosts maintain the peace and quiet.  There are no water, electric and sewer sites, which was fine, since we are used to dry camping.  I think that the lack of services makes it easier to find an open spot.  Of course, there was great access to Devil's Tower.  We really enjoyed the hiking trail around the base of the Tower.  It is easy, and is asphalt paved all the way.  There are other trails as well, but not paved.  I was very happy with our experience here.

Arrived and parked at the new Gateway Travel Center in Newcastle to check in. We have been coming to this area for an annual hunting trip for 8 years. We stayed here two years ago and upfront its not the best of campgrounds (CG), but looks like some improvements are being attempted. This CG is still the best option for the area. The travel center and RV park used to be an outdoor movie theater back when. You now check in inside the travel center’s convenience store. You go to the check out counter, fill out your paperwork, and get your assigned site. We were traveling with another RV and were assigned sites 30 and 28, which are FHUs with 50/30 AMP. Technically there were sites 31 and 29 adjacent to our sites. The sites were small enough as it was, but if someone would have come in beside us into site 31, we would have been literally an arms length away from each other.  With both of us in our party having fifth wheels with slide outs on both sides, there was no way anyone could have pulled into site 29 between us. However, no one was placed next to us during our 5 day stay and we believe the new CG management wouldn't purposely place someone next to a big rig. We recommend that once you receive your assigned site, go scope it out. They were putting in new site signs but had not gotten to our site so the number was written on the electric box with a permanent marker. Some of the sites here are standalone 30 AMP or 20 AMP, perfect for travel vans.  There is no WiFi in the CG but the travel center has free unsecured Wifi near the pumps and in the convenience store that also has a Taco Johns. The last time we stayed here, there were pipeline workers and the CG was full. This time there were only a few transient workers. They have two pretty nice tent camping areas in the grass and their restroom/shower/laundry facility was well maintained and clean. They have 2 washers and 2 dryers that were very reasonably priced at $1.50 to wash and $1.50 to dry. The RV sites do not have picnic tables nor fire rings but the the tent areas have a few. Every morning and evening we had wild turkeys and mule deer roaming around the CG. With the Fountain Inn Hotel and the RV Park pretty much co-located, this CG made a good choice for our RV and hotel staying hunting group.

This cg has a nice location not in the town area but close enough. We stayed here two nights but maybe wasn’t worth it. As there is no water and no showers. Bathroom is what you would expect from a pit toilet.

Major con would be ALL the bugs! Flies, mosquitoes and wasps 24/7 here. They were dead set on entering any tent we set up/entering our camper, grille of the car etc. It was kind of outrageous.

On the other hand the cg. is surrounded by cow pasture and the cows can come up really close to the campground. There are also coyotes and what sounds like bears at the fence line in the evening. At least during our stay we heard all three only seeing the cows close by. And there is little to no connection here incase you have to call for help for some reason.

Besides these things it is a very quiet place (maybe a little too quiet). It is first come, first serve. $16/night. We only encountered two other campers during our stay here. And had one night where the grounds were all ours. Probably a perfect place to crash for a night if you need a cheap place to be.

Most of the sites look level and are packed gravel but there are also more grassy areas for tent goers.

If you are on your way up to Devils Tower and are looking for camping this is definitely the spot instead of the KOA camping. Its about an hour away and way less crowded. If you like more of a primitive camping experience go for the homestead camping spots. All dirt (no contrete pads), some shade, a decent amount of space between camp spots and close to water. We only had fly fishing rods but still were able to catch some decent size bass. If you like fishing, and arent a skilled fly fisher, definitely bring a good casting rod- fish are all pretty big and aggressive (walleyes, bass, sunfish etc).

You can swim anywhere in the reservoir except where boats dock. If you have pets though I would be cautious around the water, there are tons of signs up about algea blooms.

Its a 6 hour drive from Denver, but I'll probably head up to Keyhole whenever Colorado has strict fire bans. Pretty neat spot, reservation only at the moment.

Pretty well maintained dirt road up to 2 sites that look across the Devils Tower. The drive up (at least at night) feels like you're in the middle of nowhere but you're actually pretty close to Devil's Tower. We got in after dark and the two spots were taken. One up on the grassy hill is a large flat spot that could accommodate a few camp set-ups, if we showed up in daylight probably would have asked. The lower one right off the road (west) has a turnaround and could accommodate 2-3 vehicles who are camping with eachother. We camped between the two sites since we came up at dark and wanted to give the folks camping there adequate space. Quiet, serene, mildy buggy.