I just had a conversation with an Idaho BLM official about the Egin Lakes campground at St. Anthony dunes. The campground will NOT be open for Memorial Day. The day use parking lot WILL be open and is open now. That lot gets very full but is being expanded to about twice its size, and some of that expansion should be completed by that weekend. The camp area will be fenced off. Once it is open, for fires you will be required to have a "fire pan", like a cut-off 55 gallon drum to keep junk off the ground. This remodel is a 3-phase project, with this being phase one. This fall phase 2 will commence, and once finished in a couple of years this will be a fully developed campground. The "triangle" that people use to camp out by the paved road is on private land, and the owner so far will tolerate campers as long as they respect the ground and stay out of the crop area. The farmers who work this land (I know them) are riders too, in fact Thunder mountain was originally named after them (officially it's called Crapo Mountain). But they're getting a little frustrated with people damaging the field and leaving litter. At Egin Campground there is a donation box since there is no charge, and all donations go right back into the campground. Almost nobody puts money in it, and if we do there is less chance of regular charges being implemented. We look like cheapskates compared to some other camp areas like the fishermen up at Birch Creek. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img] So that's the update, and from past experience there will be a wad of campers rolling in at all hours trying to find spots that aren't available. Hope to see you there, but be prepared if you're coming!

 

I forgot to mention, the campground is scheduled for opening about the end of June.

 

Good report, Shady....

It sounds like Memorial Weekend is going to be a little crowded around there.