About this place
This is a quiet, rough drive through a corner of the Rockies in southern Montana, near Dell. Coming up Interstate 15 from just north of the Montana and Idaho border, the Tendoy Mountains look like a wall with no way through. The Dell exit is the way in, and it's easy to drive past. You can also pick the byway up from Montana Highway 324.
The road looks down into Big Sheep Creek and up into Big Sheep Canyon, and it takes you through three quite different landscapes. First come the narrow rock walls of the canyon. Then a wide valley opens out, with the Continental Divide standing around it. Further north the Medicine Lodge valley runs green and winding, cut by a creek beneath the peak it shares its name with.
Very little out here has changed since the days of the early Native Americans and the mountain men. That is rare now, and it is why people make the drive.
The route runs more than 50 miles, and in summer most vehicles will manage it. Give it about three hours driving straight through, or two to three days if you want to fish, walk, watch wildlife or keep stopping.
Plan ahead
A remote gravel road with very little traffic on it. Preparation isn't optional.
- No services along the byway and no drinking water. Bring everything.
- Rain turns gravel and dirt slick and awkward. Slow down, and expect the road to be worse than it looks from behind the wheel.
- There is fuel along the route, but work your stops out before you set off and don't rely on finding one.
- Deadwood Campground is about 14 miles southwest of Dell, with several Bureau of Land Management sites, picnic tables, fire rings and a vault toilet.
What's out there
- Mountains, streams, valley floors and unusual rock formations lining several canyons.
- Walking trails off the byway, some marked and some not.
- Bighorn sheep, elk and deer.
- Fishing in clear mountain streams and lakes you can reach from the road.
- Camping areas along the route.
- Provision for bicycles and people on foot.
- Fuel, at points along the way.
About the byway itself
Big Sheep Creek is a Type I Back Country Byway, set up by the Bureau of Land Management in 1989. It is low-traffic, two-lane gravel through remote public land, kept undeveloped on purpose.
It hasn't changed category since. The Dillon Field Office looks after it.
The facts
- Cost
- Free to camp
- Roads around it
- Gravel. Usually passable for any vehicle in summer, and slippery in the wet
- Drinking water
- No, bring your own
- Toilet
- Yes, at Deadwood Campground
- Type
- Open area. Camp anywhere within it
- Managed by
- Bureau of Land Management
Getting there
Coming in from the south, leave Interstate 15 at the Dell Interchange. Turn south onto Westside Frontage Road. After about 2 miles you meet Big Sheep Creek Road. That is where the byway starts.
Ten miles along it you reach Deadwood Campground. Stay on the byway another 12 miles or so and it meets Medicine Lodge Road. Turn north there and follow it about 30 miles to Highway 324, just west of Clark Canyon Reservoir.
If you are starting from the north end on Highway 324, begin at the Medicine Lodge Road marker and follow everything above in reverse.
Coordinates 44.707297, -112.685885
Open in Google Maps Agency page
What is near here
Nothing is close to this one. Everything below is a long drive away, and each line says how far.
- Black Butte Directions
Every distance on this page is the driving distance. A short distance can still take a long time. The road may be closed for the season, covered in snow, or washed out. Many of these roads are dirt. Plan your route before you leave home. Out here there is often no phone signal to look it up on the way.
Nearest town and supplies
- Dell, MT Directions
- Dillon, MT Directions
Dillon is big enough that you’d normally expect fuel and somewhere to buy food. Nobody from here has been to check, so don’t count on it if you’re running low.
Have you been here?
Fees and access change, and the records do not always keep up. If you have been, tell us what you found.
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Add road notes for this site
The thing we cannot get from any government record is what the drive in is actually like. If you have done it, this is the most useful thing you can leave behind. We read everything before it appears, and we print a first name with it if you give one.
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Where this information comes from
The description on this page is ours. The facts in it, and the fee and facility details below it, come from the Bureau of Land Management’s own records, read in August 2026; opened and read by a person on 2026-08-27.