Campground · Beartooth Highway
A quiet, wooded base near Cooke City and Yellowstone’s northeast entrance.
Overview
Map
Plan your stop
The highest, rockiest slopes around here are a summer buffet for grizzly bears.
Beartooth Highway Tour Guide
Parkwolf is a GPS audio tour guide for Beartooth Highway. As you drive, it chimes in with what’s ahead: hidden gems, upcoming stops, history, geology, and wildlife, right through your car’s speakers.
See the Beartooth Highway audio tourRecorded for this place
Soda Butte Campground“Soda Butte Campground is ahead, with quiet, well-spaced wooded sites a mile from Cooke City. Only hard-sided vehicles can stay; no tents are allowed.”
Plays as you drive up to Soda Butte Campground in the Parkwolf Beartooth Highway Tour Guide.
More stories near here in the app
“Fantastic app with many points of information… It’s great to just turn on while you’re driving and it gives you an audio tour of the national Park. We love it!!!!”
Guide
Soda Butte Campground is a small, 27-site campground one mile east of Cooke City on US 212. Its quiet, well-spaced sites make a handy base for the Yellowstone Northeast Entrance, Lamar Valley and Beartooth Pass. Think of it as a place to stay while exploring the area, not a separate sightseeing stop.
Expect vault toilets, potable water, picnic tables, fire rings and food storage boxes. RV and trailer parking spurs average about 22 by 60 feet. Cooke City is a mile away if you need to pick up food or supplies.
Visitors often report bears in or near the campsites. A grizzly attack here on July 28, 2010, killed one camper and injured two others. It's a sobering part of this campground's history, and a reason to take its hard-sided-only rule seriously.
Wildlife
42 sightingsGrizzly BearMost seen around 7 AMSighting map
22 sightingsGray WolfMost seen around 6 AMSighting map
49 sightingsBisonMost seen around 6 AMSighting map
122 sightingsMooseMost seen around 6 AMSighting map
260 sightingsMountain GoatMost seen around 7 AMSighting map
16 sightingsBighorn SheepMost seen around 7 PMSighting mapSighting maps show where each species has been reported across Beartooth Highway. Wildlife moves, so no sighting is guaranteed.
Keep exploring
EasySoda Butte Creek Trail2.5 mi · 1.5 hr · 0.2 mi awayA short historic-route walk on gravel east of Cooke City.
ModerateWoody Falls Trail2.7 mi · 1.8 hr · 1 mi awayThree tiers of waterfall reward the short uphill walk.
EasyLady of the Lake Trail #314 mi · 2.5 hr · 1.6 mi awayA creek bridge and old cabin lead to an alpine lake.
ChallengingRepublic Creek Trail8.4 mi · 6.5 hr · 1.6 mi awayA creekside climb reaches the grassy edge of Yellowstone.
ModerateSheep Creek Basin Trail #5765.4 mi · 3.5 hr · 1.6 mi awayA high-country climb to a basin above 9,000 feet.
ChallengingLower Aero Lake Trail11.3 mi · 7.5 hr · 1.7 mi awayA long climb to an island-studded lake beneath sharp alpine peaks
ModerateCompanion Lake Trail7.5 mi · 4 hr · 1.7 mi awayA high alpine lake at the end of a long forest approach.
ModerateBlack Warrior Trail #5781.9 mi · 1.5 hr · 1.8 mi awayA rough-track climb from Miller Creek Road to near Daisy Pass.
Store · 1 mi awayCooke City StoreA working mercantile still uses its hand-crank cash register.
Visitor center · 1.1 mi awayCooke City Visitor Center and MuseumNine touchscreens bring Cooke City's local history to life.
Campground · 1.1 mi awayColter CampgroundA hard-sided-only campground two miles east of Cooke City.
Picnic area · 2.3 mi awayClarks Fork Picnic AreaA riverside pause with a little highway and flume history.Parkwolf’s Beartooth Highway ranking
The audio tour guide for the drive, plus offline maps, trails, and wildlife heatmaps for when the signal drops.
