About this permit
The Wingate Campground's eleven hike-in tent-only sites are the walk-in inventory at Dead Horse Point State Park. You park your vehicle by the restroom and hike in up to 300 feet to the site, short enough that it is not a backpacking trip, far enough that no vehicle is beside your tent.
Each site has a shade shelter, a picnic table, a fire ring and one 15 by 16-foot tent pad. All campsites have access to bathrooms with running water and dishwashing sinks, and the campground has two restrooms with flush toilets, one vault toilet and a dump station. There are no showers anywhere at Dead Horse Point, and there is no water available for RV fillups anywhere in the park. All campers must fill water storage tanks and containers before coming.
Rates are $45 a night in March, April, May, June, September and October, and $40 all other months. Day-use entry is $20 per private vehicle. All campsites and yurts can be reserved for up to four months prior to your arrival date, on a four-month rolling basis, through ReserveAmerica or by calling 1-800-322-3770. Inside the 48-hour window, campsites are walk-in only: you must appear in person at the park.
The park sits at 5,900 feet, is an International Dark Sky Park, and is 32 miles from Moab: nine miles northwest on US 191, then 23 miles southwest on Utah 313 to the end of the highway.
The route
The Wingate Campground has 31 campsites: twenty with electrical hookups for RVs or tents, and eleven hike-in tent-only sites. For the hike-in sites you park at the restroom and walk in up to 300 feet. The reservation system describes it as less than 200 yards from the parking lot. Each site has a shade shelter, picnic table, fire ring and one 15 by 16-foot tent pad, and two of the campground's sites are ADA accessible. Bathrooms with running water and dishwashing sinks serve every site, along with two restrooms with flush toilets and one vault toilet. From camp, the park's eight miles of hiking trails run out along both rims, and the Intrepid Trail System puts nearly 30 miles of mountain biking at your door.
Why it matters
Dead Horse Point is the overlook Utah puts on its own posters, and the Wingate hike-in sites are the only tent-only inventory on that mesa. You leave the vehicle at the restroom and walk in, which is a small thing that changes the entire feel of the campground: no headlights, no engines, no RV next to your tent. In an International Dark Sky Park at 5,900 feet with almost no light pollution, that matters after sunset.
The feeling
You are on a high desert mesa with a 30-yard-wide neck of land connecting it to everything else, and 2,000 feet of air below the rim. There is no water source, no shower, and the nearest services are 35 miles away in Moab. Everything you drink came in your vehicle. What you get for that is a night sky that most people never see and a sunrise over Canyonlands that starts before anyone drives up from town.
