Needles OutpostCanyonlands · Utah
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Fires allowedDetails
Campfires are allowed in the established fire rings at your site. Please never leave one unattended, and drown it dead before you sleep or leave.
Sunset over the Needles, rock spires in silhouette

Needles Outpost

Gallery

Every picture here was taken at the campground or within a short drive of it. Nothing is stock, and nothing is somebody else’s desert.

Campground Photos

Dry sites with room around them, the bell tent, and the group site off on its own.

The Mo'Rockin Bell Tent lit from within at golden hour, under juniper with a red rock wall behindThe bell tent among juniper and slickrock, chairs set out on a patterned rug in the red sandInside the bell tent — a made bed under a dreamcatcher, rugs across the floor, seating and a writing tableLooking out of the bell tent past the bed to the juniper and red sand outsideThe bed in the bell tent, dressed in rust and indigo, with a moon-phase garland along the canvas wallThe bell tent interior at dusk, the canvas glowing warm above the bedA tent pitched in the shelter of a large rockA picnic table and chairs set out in front of a tentA camper van parked under a shade canopy on a dry siteThe group site, its hand-painted sign in the foreground and a red rock wall behind

Outpost Skies

The part nobody photographs from the road.

The Outpost's yellow fuel pumps in the foreground, the Needles skyline beyond, under a gold and blue sunsetRain falling from storm clouds lit gold by the setting sun, a flat-topped butte in silhouette belowOrange and mauve sunset over the jagged Needles skyline, sagebrush in the foregroundPink and mauve storm light over a flat-topped butte, rain trailing beneath the cloudsThe sun sitting right on the horizon, bands of orange and gold cloud above sagebrush flatsThe Outpost at sunset seen from under the canopy, a fuel pump in the foreground and rain falling over the Needles beyondBanks of cloud lit orange and red by the setting sunDesert sunflowers in red earth with the sun setting behind a mesaThe sun setting over a field of desert wildflowersYellow desert flowers against a low sunSunset over the desert with a large rock in the foregroundA winter sunset over the desert at Needles OutpostSunset over the Needles, rock spires in silhouetteTwo birds perched on the Needles Outpost sign as the sun goes down

After dark

There is nothing out here to drown out the sky. On a clear night the Milky Way throws a shadow.

Someone wrapped in a plaid blanket, sitting and looking up at the Milky Way rising above silhouetted junipersA deep orange full moon setting behind the layered sandstone of the Needles at duskThe bright core of the Milky Way over a dark desert ridge, thick with starsDeep red aurora filling the sky with a band of green low on the horizon, dark rock in silhouetteA rooftop tent on a vehicle, lit warm from inside, under a star-filled night sky beside a juniperA bare juniper silhouetted against the rising moon, a shaft of light crossing the sagebrush belowThe northern lights over Needles OutpostRed and green aurora behind the constellation Orion, with a rock outcrop silhouetted at the edgeThe dust lanes and star clouds of the Milky Way filling the frame

Things to go see

We share a fence with the Needles District of Canyonlands.

Rock formations in the Needles District of CanyonlandsChesler Park in the Needles DistrictDruid Arch, a tall slab arch in the Needles DistrictThe Joint Trail, a narrow slot between rock wallsElephant Hill, the four-wheel-drive route into the NeedlesThe view from Big Spring Canyon OverlookWater-filled potholes in slickrock at Pothole PointDesert and distant mountains under gathering cloudPetroglyphs pecked into a rock face, photographed in black and whiteA person standing on rock deep in a canyon, dwarfed by the walls

Property photos

Sights around the Outpost.

The hand-lettered wooden Needles Outpost sign standing in the desertThe old Needles Outpost sign photographed in black and whiteA juniper growing straight out of a crack in bare sandstoneA tree growing from the top of a large boulderRed rock rising against a clear blue desert skyDesert landscape at Needles Outpost with red rock formations and cloud aboveTwo birds sharing a bare desert branchThe campground cat stretched out on the warm ground

Camping runs March to November.

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