Brad and Rhonda Hill: Exploring Wyoming's BLM

From the popular attractions of Yellowstone, to the remote wilderness of BLM, Brad and Rhonda Hill take us on a truck camping tour of Wyoming.  You can almost hear the coyotes calling.













The Bureau of Land Management administers approximately 256 million acres of public lands in the United States.  According to Wikipedia, that's one-eighth of the landmass in the United States.  Much of this BLM land is available to the public for free.  Boondocking anyone?

Well, it's not that easy.  Unlike national and state parks, most BLM land doesn't appear on your typical map or GPS database.  In fact, you could be driving past hundreds of miles of BLM lands and not even know it.  So how do you go about finding and using BLM lands?

Lucky for us, Hallmark RV sent us the names of two truck camping BLM experts, Brad and Rhonda Hill.  As a Trails Program Manager for the state of Wyoming, Brad regularly travels thousands of miles through Wyoming's wilderness via snowmobile, ATV, and his Hallmark pop-up truck camper.  Thanks to Brad and Rhonda, we finally have some answers about how to find and properly use BLM lands for truck camping.

Crossing Cherry Creek, Wyoming

Brad and Rhonda Hill

Brad carving near Togwotee

TCM: What are your earliest memories of camping?
 
Rhonda: From what I’ve been told by my parents, I went on my first camping trip when I was about three to four months old, in our little Scottie camper.  My father was an avid outdoorsman.  It was because of him that I grew up camping. Some of my fondest memories are of roughing it in our camper with my parents.  Once we found ourselves in this great state, we would head out in a different direction every weekend. Dad loved the adventure of traveling the back country, and I guess that’s how I got hooked- he always shared his fascination & knowledge of the great outdoors and it’s wildlife with me and it still captivates me today.

Before we moved to Wyoming, my parents and I made the local paper in our small home town when we traveled cross-country for three weeks in a home-made slide-in that my dad had built in a friend’s garage.  It was on this trip from Hopedale, Massachusetts to all states leading west that my father fell in love with Wyoming and all it had to offer for the nature lover and outdoor enthusiast.    

Brad: My family was also very outdoors oriented and, at every given opportunity, we also enjoyed hunting, fishing, and horse packing while exploring the vast outdoors of Wyoming, Colorado, and Montana.  We, like many other families back then, went tent camping and spent many a night on the open ground or tucked into the back of our trusty station wagon.
 
All through high school Rhonda and I continued to find our fun in the backcountry of our state.  Many a summer weekend, and others not so balmy, we would find ourselves in a borrowed rig bumping along a back road looking for the perfect fishing hole or camp-out spot.
 
TCM: Is your Hallmark Cuchara the first truck camper you’ve owned?
 
Brad: After we married many years later, our first truck camper together was a 1998 Shadow Cruiser.  We loved that camper!  Then I had the idea that we needed a fifth wheel camper, which we ended up living in for several months while our home was being built. It was comfortable and made a nice alternative to living in a motel for five months, but in the end we couldn’t travel to the areas that we enjoy off the blacktop.  Also, we had a hard time bringing the toys; a nineteen foot boat, a twenty-seven foot utility trailer full of quads and snowmobiles, and a horse trailer.

 

Ferris Mountains in the background

Boysen State Park - front hitch carry all and aluminum box for BBQ, shovel, charcoal, chairs, and roll a table

Crossing Cherry Creek, Wyoming

TCM: Tell us how you got your Hallmark.
 
Brad: A few years ago we purchased my dream camper, the Hallmark Cuchara XL.  When we were looking for a camper, we were close to purchasing a unit that had a slide-out and generator.  After careful thought and discussion with my wife, we chose not to buy the slide-out camper.  It was simply too heavy and the profile would not allow us to travel on our beloved back roads.  
 
As we were leaving the dealer lot, I noticed a Hallmark that was tucked behind some other units.  I asked Rhonda to come over and look.  At first she was not in favor of a pop-up because she thought we wouldn’t have any storage.  After some forty plus years of camping, she had never tried a pop-up camper.  I asked her to take a look and that was all it took.  She was hooked!  
 
After I explained the solid reputation of Hallmark and the exceptional customer service the Bill Ward family is known for, it was all over.  All we had to do was load our camper in the back of our pick-up.
 
Rhonda: Our camper has lots of storage.  I really didn’t expect a pop-up truck camper to have the features of a hard side.  For some reason I though pop-ups wouldn’t have the cabinetry and storage and would be flimsy and wouldn’t feel secure.  None of that was the case with our Hallmark.
 
Brad: I had always heard of Hallmark and Aspen of being rock solid campers with excellent customer service.  Plus, this camper fits our lifestyle very well.  We have camped in all conditions; the desert sun, high mountain winds, heavy rain and snow storms where the temperatures are below zero degrees Fahrenheit.  We have been very comfortable in our Hallmark camper.  
 
With its low profile, carbon fiber roof, and solid construction, we can travel on the back roads without the worry of low hanging tree limbs that we may encounter.  If we do, we can rest assured that the limbs will not tear a hole in the roof.  
 
TCM: The carbon roof is a relatively new feature for Hallmark.  What do you think of it?
 
Brad: The carbon fiber roof has been outstanding.  There was small defect in the rubber membrane on the camper’s roof when we bought it, that wasn’t bearing on the integrity or structures.  The Wards put the new roof on free of charge.  We were absolutely in shock because we were not the original owners of the camper.  Hallmark stands behind their product and took care of the customer.  Many companies today should learn from Hallmark.  The roof is bulletproof.  I wax it, which may be a bit extreme.  The roof is sound, durable, and we love to hear the raindrops on the roof during a nice rain shower.
 
TCM: What does rain on a carbon fiber camper roof sound like?
 
Rhonda: The rain is quieter than on an aluminum camper roof!  I grew up with campers.  I just don’t feel like I’m in a soft sided camper at all.  For example, a couple of days last spring, early in the season we went to a lake about thirty miles away.  There was a lightening storm and the wind was blowing.  The camper didn’t even move.  It’s not like being in a tent where you’re rocking and rolling in the wind.
 

Rennie and Odin, German Wirehairs

Brad and Odin at our family ranch adjacent to Bighorn National Forest near Sheridan, Wyoming

Rhonda and Odin at Yellowstone Lake

TCM: How do you accommodate your two German Wirehair dogs in your pop-up?
 
Brad: Well, we have a quad cab Dodge turbo diesel truck.  The dogs ride well together in the back seat.  While we’re sleeping, the camper dinette is theirs.  We also spend a lot of time outdoors.  So having eighty-plus pound animals isn’t an issue in the camper, even though by five in the morning they will sneak their way up into the cabover bed.
 
Rhonda: Our dogs will sleep on our feet, on our heads, or in between us.  We’re never alone.
 
TCM: We joke that Harley, our cat, actually expands to several times his size at night and takes up the whole bed.  Of course as soon as you turn the lights on he instantly snaps back to his normal, yet plump, cat size.  Some day we’ll catch him.  What do you do to keep your dogs cool in the summer and warm in the winter?
 
Brad: We have pretty much all the conveniences of other truck campers except for air conditioning.  At the elevations we camp at, we don’t find the need for air conditioning.  We have canopies and an awning.  The dogs seek water in the summer.  In the winter months, the Hallmark camper is very warm because it is very well insulated and we have an efficient heater in it.  We’ve been in weather that’s twenty degrees below zero.  We heat the camper to sixty-five or seventy degrees and that’s comfortable for us.
 
TCM: Matt Ward of Hallmark told us that you rescue dogs all over the country.  Tell us about that.
 
Rhonda: In my previous life, before Brad and I were married, I was an Animal Control Officer.  Animals are a big part of our life.  I fell in love with this particular breed, German Wirehairs, and I just can’t have one.  Dogs are like potato chips, ya gotta love ‘em all.  We’ve always had dogs and always will.  Matt doesn’t know that we recently rescued a horse also!  I’m really lucky my husband tolerates my dog and horse addiction.
 
Brad: Rhonda surprised me with a New Years present, a German Wirehair from Pennsylvania.  She had the dog flown in from Pittsburgh to Denver.  We went to Denver to adopt and pick him up.  Now he pretty much runs the place. That’s another reason we love camping; our furry kids get to come with us.

 

Grand Tetons taken from the Bridger-Teton National Forest near Togwotee

Brad with his nephews Justin and Garrett, with the Tetons in the background

Brad catching some air near Dubois, Wyoming

TCM: That’s quite a present.  Brad, as a Trails Program Manager, could you share some of your knowledge of Bureau of Land Management (BLM) areas.
 
Brad: BLM lands are typically in the mountain west in lower elevations.  Most BLM areas are desert landscape, with few trees, shrubs, sagebrush, and rabbit brush in lower lands of western United States.  In Wyoming, we have seventeen million acres of BLM land.  We go out in what we call the high desert, which is rocky terrain with sage and greasewood, wild horses, Pronghorn, Mule deer, coyotes, and other wildlife.  
 
Being out on the BLM land is great for us.  We won’t see anybody for days.  We look for that solitude when we go out camping.
 
I’m the Trails Program Manager for the State of Wyoming.  I’m fortunate to be paid to ride ATVs and snowmobiles.  Prior to this position when I was working in the field, I would typically ride three to four thousand miles per season on the snowmobile.  Now I’m lucky to ride 1,000 miles a season.  I’ve seen a lot of the country.  Working in the backcountry is awesome.  Every day I see something new.

TCM: Wow.  That’s amazing.  Do you have any advice for people who want to go truck camping in Wyoming’s BLM areas?
 
Brad: I would suggest contacting the local land management agency.  You should ask about any special camping regulations.  There are different uses in different areas of the state.  For example, in some areas, they may allow you drive off road.  Or, there may be fire restrictions during a drought.
 
TCM: How does one navigate in BLM lands?
 
Brad: The BLM lands in Wyoming have road signs for a good portion of the roads and there are maps.  The scale of the maps are enormous.  It can be challenging to know when you’re on BLM land.  Benchmarkmaps.com puts together a nice map.  We use that as a reference for traveling BLM and National Forest areas.
 
TCM: Don’t a lot ranchers use BLM land?
 
Brad: Yes.  There are a lot of land leases that ranchers lease from BLM.  There can be gates across the roads, so you need to check and see if access is allowed.  The land owners will usually let you access the land if you ask them first.
 
TCM: Are the BLM lands free to camp on?
 
Brad: In near future some BLM lands may be instituting a fee to maintain the campgrounds, hiking trails, and facilities in the future.  Always check with the local land managing agency before you go.  It is the unwritten code of the west.
 

Descending into the headwaters of Cherry Creek

Looking at Devils Gate on the Sweetwater River near Independence Rock

Two track road near the Ferris Mountains

TCM: Tell us about how you use BLM land.
 
Brad: We go out three to five days at a time, depending on what our schedules allow.
 
Rhonda: Keep in mind that Wyoming is very primitive.  We have relatively few KOAs or campgrounds with facilities where we like to go.  We take enough supplies and water for four or five days.  You don’t want to be broken down on the high desert with no water.
 
Wyoming is the lowest populated state in the nation.  There are fewer people per square mile than any other state outside of Alaska.  Our advantage is that we network with each other as residents and share our knowledge of the area with family and friends.
 
If you really want to know about a local area’s BLM lands, just talk to people.  The local people are usually happy to help.  Some people look at Wyoming as isolated, but we see it as a big neighborhood with people that we know.  It’s a wonderful place for families to experience the back country.  
 
TCM: Do you use a GPS when you’re out on BLM land?
 
Brad: I have a satellite phone.  I also use a handheld Garmin 60 GPS.  It’s pretty user friendly.  There are Garmin files of snowmobile trails throughout the state.  As Garmin collects data, it will push it out to users.  Garmin Topo provides updates to software with boundaries of National Forest and BLM land.  It’s coming along; it’s just slow.
 
Keep in mind, there is quite a bit of inaccuracy in that type of information.  You can not rely solely on GPS devices in the mountain west.  It’s not perfect by any means.  It’s always best to have a paper map with you, and a compass.
 

Old Faithful, Yellowstone National Park

Beetle Kill trees near Yellowstone (gray in color) plaguing the mountain west

There are many buffalo in Yellowstone National Park

TCM: You said that you have been to Yellowstone many times.  For those who have not been to Yellowstone at all, what do you recommend they see?
 
Rhonda: Usually because of the snow, Yellowstone doesn’t officially open until after Memorial day.  There have been years when we haven’t been able to get in until early June.  I like to go in the early fall right after the kids are in school and just before it closes for the season.  In the spring, you may be able to catch sight of all the new elk calves, bison calves, deer fawns, and maybe even a mama bear with new cubs.
 
TCM: What do you like about Yellowstone in the early fall, other than the reduced attendance in the park?
 
Rhonda: The bears are looking for food, the fishing is great, and the camping is great.  Most of the folks have gone home for the season, so there’s plenty of room.  There’s primitive camping and facilities, but always check and see what’s going on before you go through Yellowstone.  There’s lots of construction and the geological studies are going on all the time.  You never know what’s going to be closed.
 
Definitely visit Old Faithful.  Go through the east entrance through Cody or up from the South through Moran Junction, Wyoming.  Make sure you go past the west shore of Yellowstone lake.  There are lots of bear sightings there and also at Fishing Bridge.  There’s a lot of wildlife at Norris Junction.  You’ll see elk and moose.  The Lamar Valley for wolves, and the Hayden Valley is a hotspot for Bison.
 
You also have to see the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone.  Go to the Lower Falls lookout and get a picture of the falls.  It’s known worldwide.  On the loop road, there are plenty of vendors and gas stations.  It’s an easy ride, and it’s pretty well developed, considering the vastness of the park.  Yellowstone can make you feel very small.
 
Yellowstone is the Serengeti of the United States.  You can drive through and see seventy-five percent of the wildlife in Wyoming in an entire day.  There are bears, wolves, deer, elk, eagle, osprey, herons, Trumpeter Swans, moose, coyotes, and more.  In Yellowstone, you are in a wildlife preserve without the commercialism.
 
Brad: One best places is Thorofare which is on the border of the park.  The historic Thorofare route over the Continental Divide begins well outside Yellowstone and enters the park in its remotest corner.  Just Google “thorofare” and you’ll find lots of information.
 
TCM: What is Thorofare?
 
Brad: It’s the most remote location in the lower forty-eight.  There is no occupied dwelling in the contiguous United States farther from a road than the Thorofare Patrol Cabin.  It is amazing!  There are no power lines and no roads.  The only signs of civilization that you’ll see are the occasional contrails from airline traffic.  You can only hike in or take horses.  It’s very difficult to explain how remote it is and how you feel being that far back in the true wilderness as you are disconnected from society.  It’s one of the last great frontiers in the world.
 
TCM: That sounds amazing.  One more thing for our bucket list.  If people were to visit Wyoming, what do you suggest they see?  
 
Brad: The Wyoming tourism office offers a great website.  There are a lot of opportunities.  Wyoming State Parks do really nice job of performing period-type reenactments of frontier life.  There’s a lot of neat stuff that can be found through the tourism website.
 
Rhonda: There are many camping opportunities that are off the beaten path that locals love to talk about- like flyfishing that is pretty accessible for truck camping.  We are lucky in the respect that it doesn’t have to cost thousands of dollars to catch a fish here and you don’t have to have a guide to go.

Fall in Wyoming, Grand Tetons from the Gros Ventre River Area

Gros Ventre River elk feeding ground in the forefront with a "controlled prescribed burn" in the background and the Teton's through the smoke

Elk camp at Cherry Creek with the Hallmark popped-up

TCM: Is there anything else you’d like to share with the TCM readers?
 
Rhonda: I’m too old and too spoiled to go back to tent camping.  I like our camper.  We highly recommend it!
 
Brad: We’ve done the fifth wheel thing and the tent camping thing.  There’s nothing like truck camping!
 
TCM: We couldn’t agree more.  Thank you so much for sharing your story with us.
 
Brad and Rhonda: You’re welcome.  Come visit us in wonderful Wyoming!