About this place
Pioneers and gold rushers used the Hastings Cutoff from 1846 to 1850. It was meant to save 300 miles off the usual route to California through Idaho.
The Fremont expedition found the way in 1845. A year later Lansford W. Hastings promoted it hard as a shortcut to the Humboldt River in Nevada, and a great many people believed him.
It was not one. The route crossed 90 miles of the Great Salt Lake Desert with no water at all. It went over sand dunes and mud flats, in midsummer heat, with heavy wagons.
The crossing broke people. Emigrant parties lost livestock and wagons to it. On the salt flats the wagons sank into mud under the thin crust of salt. The days the Donner-Reed party lost there helped trap them later in the Sierra Nevada snow.
Abandoned wagon parts lay out on the flats into the 1930s. In places you can still see the wheel tracks.
The facts
- Cost
- Camping fee not confirmed
- Stay limit
- 14 days
- Type
- Open area. Camp anywhere within it
- Managed by
- Bureau of Land Management
Getting there
Follow Interstate 80 west out of Salt Lake City to Wendover. The way passes Grantsville, Skull Valley, Cedar Mountains-Hastings Pass and Silver Island Mountains-Donner Reed Pass.
Coordinates 41.94338, -113.047416
Open in Google Maps Agency page
What is near here
There is another spot of ours within reach, and some better-known places further out.
- Black Pine Cone Directions
- Black Pine Mountains High Point Directions
- California National Historic Trail (NHT), Bidwell-Bartelson Route Directions
- Bull Mountain Directions
- Black Pine Peak 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
- Snowville, UT Directions
- Malad City, ID Directions
Malad City 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.
Why “at least”: this route is hard to measure. We worked the drive out twice, with two separate mapping tools, and they gave different answers. That usually means there is no road close to the campsite, so the drive doubles back a long way. The figure above is the longer of the two. The real drive could be further still, so check the route before you set off.
Why the drive to town is usually twice what the map says — what we found measuring every campsite in this guide.
When it’s time to move on
You can camp here for 14 days. After that you have to move on, and the Bureau of Land Management usually wants you at least 25 to 30 miles away. So the free campsites closest to you are the ones you cannot use.
Four in this guide sit inside that 25 miles. The nearest one you could move to is Hogup Mountains Designated Routes, Utah — 34 miles in a straight line, but at least a 45 mile drive.
Why “at least”: there is no road right at this campsite, so the drive is hard to measure and the real one could be further. Check the route before you set off.
This guide covers five states and does not list every free campsite, so there may be something closer that we do not hold. Check this site’s own rule before you rely on it.
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.
Thank you, that is recorded. It helps the next person.
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.
Thank you. A person will read it before it goes on the page.
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.