About this place
Cowskin is five sites at the top of three miles of dirt road, climbing away from the Colorado River at Dewey Bridge.
The bridge is the story round here. It went up in 1916, a wooden suspension bridge 502 feet long. It was the first lasting link between this corner of Utah and Grand Junction. It stayed the longest suspension bridge in Utah until April 2008. That spring a young boy playing with matches at a campground nearby started a fire, and it burned the deck. The remains are still standing beside Highway 128.
Moab is about 30 miles back down the river road. There’s no water here, so bring all of it with you.
The facts
- Cost
- Camping fee not confirmed
- Type
- Specific campsite
- Managed by
- Bureau of Land Management
Getting there
At Dewey Bridge, turn east onto the road on the south side of the Colorado River. Follow that dirt road about 3 miles. Cowskin Campground is on its east side.
Coordinates 38.785147, -109.263479
Open in Google Maps Agency page
What is near here
This is a good base for somewhere people travel a long way to see.
- Arches National Park Directions
- Delicate Arch Directions
- Landscape Arch Directions
- Dead Horse Point State Park 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
- Castle Valley, UT Directions
- Moab, UT Directions
Moab 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 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
On most public land you can camp for 14 days before you have to move on. Check this site’s own limit before you plan a long stay. When you move on, 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.
Two in this guide sit inside that 25 miles. The nearest one you could move to is Nefertiti Recreation Area, Utah — 52 miles in a straight line, but a 78 mile drive.
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; opened and read by a person on 2026-08-27.