planning the second week of september, spartanburg to the black hills, which is 1,600 miles each way and by a long way the farthest we have taken this thing. 2016 cougar 366RDS, 38 feet 7 inches of it, behind a 2500.
i have been clicking around the custer state park reservation map for two nights and i cannot tell what is real. some loops list sites at 40 feet and then the photo shows a pad on a curve with a tree in the middle of it. so which loops actually take a 38 footer, is it smarter to sit in a private park and drive in, and will somebody please tell me about the tunnels. a guy at work swears he had to back a fifth wheel a quarter mile on the needles highway.
SD
mod_sharon_d
Moderator
Rapid City, SD
112 posts, joined Jul 2025
tows with2015 Ford F-350 crew, long bed2017 Montana 3791RD
i live forty minutes from there, so here it is loop by loop. custer state park, the five that matter to you.
game lodge has the longest pads in the park and the flattest ground. this is where i send 38 footers. the back ins on the outside of the loop are the long ones.
blue bell has a handful that will take 40 feet, but the turn off 87 into the loop is tight and there is a dip at the bottom that will drag a long rear overhang. go in slow.
stockade north has pull throughs and they are fine. stockade south is shorter.
grace coolidge is shaded and beautiful and short. do not.
center lake and legion lake are small trailer country. legion has a couple that will take 30 feet and that is the ceiling.
sylvan lake is tents and vans up a mountain road. i am not going to talk you out of it, the road will.
book at gfp.sd.gov and read the length on the individual site page, not the loop page. it is listed per site, it is accurate in my experience, and it means total length, so your truck is out of that number if you can unhook.
second week of september is the right call, but know the buffalo roundup is the last friday of the month and the whole area books out around it. elk are bugling by then and the creek bottoms are turning.
the tunnels, since nobody believes it until they are stopped in one.
needles highway is SD 87 through the park, and the needles eye tunnel is a bit over 8 feet wide and under 10 feet tall. that is not a fifth wheel. that is barely a dually with the mirrors folded. iron mountain road is US 16A with the pigtail bridges, three tunnels, and the tightest of them is around 10 feet wide. also no.
get in and out of the hills on US 16 or 385. the problem is your phone, which sees 87 as the shorter line and has no idea what you are dragging. i marked the park loops as a no truck route before i left cody and it still tried to turn me once.
WC
workamper_couple
Weekend site
Yakima, WA
29 posts, joined Jul 2025
tows with2014 Ford F-350 dually, 6.72019 Reflection 297RSTS
we hosted two seasons near hill city, so here is the private park side of it.
rafter j bar south of hill city has genuinely long pull throughs and wide interior roads, and with a 38 footer the roads matter more than the site number does. horse thief up toward rushmore is pretty and carved into a hillside, the sites are stepped and short. the big place at palmer gulch is enormous and busy and has everything, if a resort does not bother you.
one thing nobody mentions. coming up 16 out of rapid city is a long steady pull and it bakes in the afternoon. 385 from the north is gentler. you are on a cummins so you will be fine either way, just watch your temps the first time up.
SD
mod_sharon_d
Moderator
Rapid City, SD
112 posts, joined Jul 2025
tows with2015 Ford F-350 crew, long bed2017 Montana 3791RD
two more while you are driving that far anyway. elk mountain in wind cave has no hookups and the loop is narrow with a tight turn at the top, and 35 feet is the honest practical limit. i have seen people wedged up there. cedar pass out in the badlands will take your 38 easily, hookups and paved pads, but there is no shade anywhere and september afternoons still run 90 out there.
fill your fresh tank in hermosa or custer and not in the park.
if you are coming that far, the wyoming side is two hours past the hills and worth three nights. keyhole state park outside moorcroft has big open sites on the water and nearly nobody in september, and devils tower is forty minutes from the gate.
i-90 between gillette and moorcroft is the windiest stretch i tow regularly. if the flag at the truck stop in gillette is standing straight out, get a motel and go in the morning. i am not being cute. i have seen a fifth wheel on its side there.
back, and thank you all. 3,340 miles round trip and the trailer is in one piece.
game lodge, site on the outside of the loop like sharon said, back in. 38 feet 7 went in with maybe six feet to spare and the truck sat in the overflow lot. 34 degrees one morning and i had not brought the heated hose, so i filled the fresh tank and ran off the pump for two days. buffalo walked through the loop twice, which my wife now talks about more than rushmore.
385 in, 16 out, no tunnels and no drama. and we did meet the guy. not a fifth wheel, a fellow in a rented class c at the needles eye who had to back about 300 yards with a ranger holding traffic. so the story is real, it just could not have been a fifth wheel, because a fifth wheel would not have made the first switchback.
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