About this permit
A backcountry camping permit is required year-round for every overnight trip into the Charon's Garden Wilderness Area. Permits are not required for day hiking. Recreation.gov is now the only way to get one. The refuge stopped issuing them on site.
The permit runs in fixed three-day periods, Friday-Saturday-Sunday or Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday, and none are issued for Thursday. No more than ten people are permitted across any three-day period, and a single permit holds a maximum of five, so the wilderness fills with two parties. Reservations open up to three months in advance.
The camping area is a 1.5-mile hike from the Sunset Picnic Area on an unmarked trail the refuge rates moderate to strenuous. Fees are a $10 refuge fee plus the $6 Recreation.gov reservation fee, plus $5 per person, and none of it is refundable once the permit is issued.
The route
Everything starts at the Sunset Picnic Area, which is the only authorised parking for backcountry campers and where the permit has to sit on your dashboard. From there it is a 1.5-mile hike to the designated backcountry camping area. The refuge is explicit that the trail is not marked and rates the walk moderate to strenuous.
The permit is not a per-night reservation. It is issued for one of two fixed three-day blocks (Friday-Saturday-Sunday or Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday), and no permits at all are issued for Thursday. Ten people is the ceiling across the whole block, and one permit can hold at most five, so two parties can fill the wilderness.
Water is the planning problem. The refuge tells you to bring it and not to rely on streams or ponds, and there is a standing boil order for all areas west of Doris Campground. There are no restrooms in the wilderness and you are expected to pack out solid human waste.
Why it matters
Charon's Garden is the one place in Oklahoma where you can get a federally issued backcountry camping permit, and the refuge holds the whole three-day period to ten people. Congress designated the wilderness inside a refuge established in 1905 to protect the Wichitas' ancient granite and the wildlife on it, and the permit exists so the solitude survives being 90 minutes from Oklahoma City.
The feeling
The mountains do not look like Oklahoma. Rounded granite domes rise straight out of mixed-grass prairie, and the wilderness floor is a chaos of boulders the size of cars with blackjack oak growing between them. There is no cell coverage, no restroom, no marked trail to the camping area and, most nights, nobody else inside the boundary.
