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10 campsites with picnic tables and fire rings on Big Eightmile Creek. Several dirt roads and trails in the area are open to hiking and mountain biking. Travel up Eighmile Creek Canyon, up Dairy Creek Canyon, or to the historic Blue Jay Mine. Never go into abandoned mine shafts!
Big Eightmile Campground is 14 miles west of Leadore on Big Eightmile Creek. Take the Lee Creek Road at the junction of Highway 28 and 29 in Leadore west 5 miles, follow Forest Service Road #096, 9 miles southwest to Big Eightmile Creek Campground.
I really like this place but the road getting here is ridiculous. Sometimes 2 mph is too fast.
Worst place to camp! Destroyed 2 bikes on one of the trails to a lake due to the shale rock putting holes in the motors.
The road in just about destroyed our camper on the way in too. DONT GO HERE!!!
Wouldn't recommend. I went here with my family. There is a lot of dead fall and the trails are very rocky. If you have a camper over 10 feet tall, trees scrape the roof and sides as you are going in not to mention the road is not maintained and is very rough going in.
Not for the faint of heart. Trails, or I should say trials are dangerous, loose shale on cliff edges, old mining road leading nowhere, all matter of untamed wildlife. If you have money to lose repairing your equipment and know how to act around wild bears and territorial moose, go right ahead and visit this death trap.
First, let's start by saying the campground is amazing, with a lot of trees and a creek bordering one side that you can camp by. The views are breathtaking, but there is a downside. The last 5 miles getting into the campground is really rough. Plan on going about 5 miles per hour or less. If the road was better, you would never get a camping spot. It would just be overcrowded. There are 4 lakes you can hike or ATV (size restrictions) up to, but the trails are VERY ROUGH. If you have littles in a side-by-side, their necks become very tired and helmets bang together most of the time. I was on a 4-wheeler and it gave my (female) arms a solid workout. The lake with the best trail, Big Eightmile, has a no-passing, narrow trail with a sheer cliff on one side, for part of the way. Everson Lake was extremely rocky and really wears you out. Shroud Lake was the most advanced trail, with some steep inclines and boulders to crawl over. It’s been 9 years since I’ve been to Dairy Lake, so I can’t give a fair review. The best parts of the trip were: The lakes are gorgeous and well worth visiting, but again the littles got very impatient and the ride feels like a full-cycle in a clothes dryer. Secondly, Big Eightmile Campground has the best creek ever. Not too deep, so the kids were able to play and run up and down and through the trees. Several pole bridges for them to cross and very narrow. All the kids had a blast at the camp sight. This campground has outhouses, a water pump, picnic tables and fire rings and we had both tents and trailers (on generators) up there. It’s a great campground, but one that would be better to visit for a longer period of time than over a short weekend, for how much work it takes to get there. Bottom line, if you can handle the rough road and rough trails, there is a lot to see.
