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Fire lookout · Carbon County, Wyoming

Blackhall Lookout

Also known as Blackhall Mountain

Current 1963 R-6 flattop tower in Medicine Bow NF, staffed since at least 1943 at the site, listed NHLR 1997, now a Recreation.gov rental.

Visit & stay

You can rent this lookout for overnight stays through recreation.gov.

Getting there
Additionally, the last 3 miles leading to Blackhall Mountain Lookout require a high clearance vehicle with 4WD.

Overview Resting atop of a nearly 11,000-foot summit, Blackhall Mountain Lookout is perched in the Sierra Madre Range in southeast Wyoming. Traveling to the end of one of the highest roads in Wyoming rewards the visitor with panoramic views of the Medicine Bow-Routt National Forest. Built in 1963, and listed on the National Historic Registry, this remote lookout tower sleeps 4 comfortably with one queen sized bed, and one twin sized bunk bed. The tower is equipped with LED solar lights, and strong AT&T and Union signals. Don’t miss the beautiful Wyoming sunrises and sunsets and an occasional lightning storm from the wrap-around catwalk offering 360-degree views! Being a remote cabin, water & Propane are not available, please plan ahead and bring your own drinking water and your own propane stove so you can cook during your stay. A vault toilet is located nearby. Also, please bring your own bedding, dishes, silverware, and cooking utensils. Outlets and charge ports are not available. Additionally, the last 3 miles leading to Blackhall Mountain Lookout require a high clearance vehicle with 4WD. Packing a saw in case of fallen trees on the road is also recommended. Lastly, please be advised this is a functioning fire tower and therefore availability of the cabin could be modified on the reservation system at any time to be utilized during a fire. Enjoy your stay at this historic site! Please follow the Pack it in Pack it out method Charges & Cancellations If I book this reservation today, what are my options to change or cancel? Please remember that reservations at these facilities prevent other visitors from using these sites. Planned changes to your stay should be made as far in advance as possible. You can make changes to your reservation ahead of your arrival date in My Reservations. Changes If your new stay dates are completely different from your original stay dates, there is a $10 change fee (per reserved site). There are no additional fees for: Adding or removing nights to your stay. Changing to a different campsite. Balances will adjust based on your new stay's nightly rate. Cancellations You can cancel the reservation any time before the date of your scheduled arrival. You will receive a refund for your stay, minus the following fees: $10 cancellation fee Any reservation fees (only if paid when booking) Any previous change fees Late cancellation penalties may also apply: What is “Late”? For individual campsites, a late cancellation applies starting from midnight 1 calendar day before your scheduled check-in. For cabins and group sites, a late cancellation applies starting from midnight 14 calendar days or fewer before your scheduled check-in. Late Fee In addition to the fees listed above, a late cancellation will also subtract your first night's recreation use fee from any refund owed. As of the expected check-in day, cancellations or changes to your stay are not possible through My Reservations. It is at the facility's discretion to support additional Late Cancellations, No Show, or Early Departure updates – on-site personnel may not be able to assist. These changes carry penalties and may forfeit recreation use fees. For additional details, please visit here.

Book on recreation.gov

Rental details from recreation.gov, checked 19 Oct 2026. Rules, fees and seasons change, so confirm on the booking page before you go. Data source: ridb.recreation.gov

Access

Open to the public. Rentable cabin via Recreation.gov; last 3 miles require high-clearance 4WD

Can you climb it?
Yes
Road to the top?
No, you have to hike
Trail
High-clearance 4WD required for final 3 miles
Staffing
Unknown

Facts

Status
Standing
Type
Two-story building15'x15' R-6 flattop cab with catwalk on a 10' concrete block baseThe design: R-6
Built of
WoodGoing by its design; no source says so in words.
Height
10 ft (3.0 m)
Elevation
10,913 ft (3,326 m)
Agency
U.S. Forest Service
Land
Federal land
Location
Carbon County, Wyoming
Coordinates
41.03281, −106.68402
This entry
VerifiedResearched, then checked independently. Updated 19 Oct 2026.
Firefinder id
us-wy-blackhall

View from the cab

What you see from the cab: every ridge out to about 93 miles, the named peaks in sight, and other fire lookouts within view, worked out from terrain data in your browser.

Downloads about 3.5 MB of terrain data the first time.

Or see what it could see on the map: the ground in its line of sight.

History

Then and now

  1. 1943 StaffedNewspaper accounts document staffed lookout work at Blackhall, including a 16-year-old forest guard's 68-day stintSource: westlookouts.weebly.com
  2. 1950 BuiltSource: firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page
  3. 1963 BuiltCurrent 15'x15' R-6 flattop tower built by Forest ServiceSource: nhlr.org
  4. No record between 1963 and 1997
  5. 1997 Added to the National Historic Lookout RegisterRegistered as NHLR US 229 on September 1, 1997Source: nhlr.org
  6. No record between 1997 and 2013
  7. 2013 Condition assessmentHistoriCorps performed a condition assessment of the lookout at the Forest Service request.Source: firelookout.org
  8. 2017 RestoredHistoriCorps again carried out considerable repair work in summer 2017, aiming to make it ready for public rental.Source: firelookout.org
  9. TodayStandingIt still stands, as far as our sources know.

Old maps of this spot

USGS topographic maps from the years a lookout stood may show it, often as a small symbol labelled “Lookout”. See the old topo maps around it on the Firefinder map, or find every scanned sheet of this spot on USGS TopoView (click the spot there to list them, with dates and downloads).

Story

Researched 4 Oct 2026, fact-checked.

Blackhall Lookout sits atop a ridge in the Sierra Madre Range of Wyoming's Medicine Bow National Forest, at just over 10,900 feet.1 The Forest Service built the current tower in 1963: a 15-by-15-foot R-6 "flattop" cab with a catwalk, set on a 10-foot concrete block base.1 The Recreation.gov listing for the rental cabin agrees with the Register on that build year.2

Newspaper accounts place staffed lookout work on Blackhall Mountain back to at least 1943. That September, a sixteen-year-old forest guard named Clay Apple finished a 68-day solo stint on the peak, the youngest fire watcher in the Medicine Bow forest that season, credited with spotting three fires during his summer there.3 Another clipping from the same week describes a lookout being transferred to "Black Hall lookout" from a post at Hahns Peak, suggesting the site was already an established fire-detection post before the present tower went up two decades later.3

According to the NHLR, the 1963 tower was staffed for about 25 years before being placed on standby status, meaning it stopped having a seasonal fire lookout but remained standing.1 It was added to the National Historic Lookout Register on September 1, 1997, nominated by the Medicine Bow-Routt National Forest supervisor.1

Today the lookout is a rentable cabin through Recreation.gov, reached by a high-clearance, four-wheel-drive road for the final three miles.2 It sleeps up to four, with a queen bed and a twin bunk, solar LED lighting, and a nearby vault toilet, but no running water or propane, so guests pack in their own.2 Recreation.gov notes it remains a functioning fire tower, so the rental can be pulled from the booking system if it's needed for fire duty.2

  1. Blackhall Lookout, National Historic Lookout Register, http://nhlr.org/lookouts/us/wy/blackhall-lookout/ (accessed 2026-10-04). ↩
  2. Blackhall Lookout, Recreation.gov, https://www.recreation.gov/camping/campgrounds/10327282 (accessed 2026-10-04). ↩
  3. Blackhall Mountain, West Lookouts (newspaper clippings: Steamboat Pilot, Sept. 2 & 4, 1943), https://westlookouts.weebly.com/blackhall-mountain.html (accessed 2026-10-04). ↩

Photos

Blackhall Mountain Lookout - 2012
Blackhall Mountain Lookout - 2012 (2012)Photo: Ron Kemnow, via National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Blackhall Mountain Lookout
Blackhall Mountain LookoutPhoto: National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved · source
Blackhall Mtn. in 2010
Blackhall Mtn. in 2010 (2010)Photo: Andy Walters, via firelookout.com · source

Photos keep their own rights and are shown with credit. Is one of these yours? You can ask for a different credit or for removal.

Where sources disagree

We show disagreements between sources instead of quietly picking one. If you know which is right, please tell us.

  • Sources disagree on the year it was built.

    • firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page: 1950
    • recreation.gov: 1963

    Sources give different build years. Often one counts the first lookout on the site and another the structure there now.

Sources

  1. National Historic Lookout Register (NHLR) Gave us: name, location, elevation, what it is built of, register numbers, agency, dates, photos, links National Historic Lookout Register (nhlr.org) · All rights reserved (American Resources, Inc.); facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  2. Forest Fire Lookout Association (FFLA) - US lookout lists Gave us: county, type, status, register numbers, links Forest Fire Lookout Association (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts extracted only, no prose copied. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  3. Recreation Information Database (recreation.gov) Gave us: ownership, access, rental details, links Data source: ridb.recreation.gov · Public data from the US government · retrieved 19 Oct 2026
  4. firelookout.com -- Rex Kamstra's Forest Fire Lookout Page Gave us: dates, photos, links firelookout.com · No licence stated on the site; facts only (coordinates, elevation, built/destroyed years, design, agency). Photos mirrored with the site's stated credit. · retrieved 4 Oct 2026
  5. Forest Fire Lookout Association chapter reports Gave us: dates, links Forest Fire Lookout Association, chapter and restoration-grant reports (firelookout.org) · No licence stated; facts only (dates, names, the kind of work done). Every note is our own wording and every event links to the FFLA report it comes from. Positions are copied from the NHLR, FFLOS and FFLA records. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  6. FOREST LOOKOUTS -- western US (Ron Kemnow's weebly sites) Gave us: height Ron Kemnow's Forest Lookouts sites (westlookouts, californialookouts, idaholookouts, montanalookouts, oregonlookouts and washingtonlookouts .weebly.com) · No licence stated; facts only (county, land manager, status word, coordinates where the page's own map widget gives them, township-range-section, height and design hints, links). The site's own newspaper quotes, citations and narrative are not reproduced. · retrieved 8 Oct 2026
  7. Firefinder research Gave us: summary, design, height, status, agency, access, visiting details, dates, links, fact-check Firefinder research (sources cited in the story footnotes) · Our own research notes; each fact cites its source in the lookout's story

More about this lookout elsewhere

Firefinder takes facts (places, dates, numbers) from these sources and writes its own words. See all sources and licences.