Arc Dome is a great place to camp and hike, we camped there on the first night of a three-day trip many years ago when our '84 FJ60 was brand new. I woke up early and hiked for a while before sunrise with our 3-year-old son - letting my wife and 9-month-old son sleep in. The next day we headed east over the next couple of mountain ranges, with a stop at Lunar Crater. It's pretty impressive and worth a visit if you haven't seen it before. We didn't make our destination of Troy Peak because we got stuck mired in the mudflats in Railroad Valley, so we camped in the middle of the valley until we could dig out the next morning.
BTW, it looks like they're going to town with the 215 Beltway between Cheyenne and Hualapai. I didn't think they'd ever fill the big hole at the old gravel quarry.
Love it up there!!
My first trip, in 44, was to Arc Dome, Big Smokey Valley, Monitor Valley and Reese River Valley, with my dear old friend , Sgt Gunner.
We slept, the first night, in 44, on the east side of Arc Dome, above the Big Smokey Valley, near the Ophir Canyon trai,l and hiked a bit of it the next morning, before driving on up to Austin, to gas up and had a great burger, before working our way around to the Reese River Valley and into the western side of Arc Dome. Here we are that first evening.
We tent camped, under the trees along San Juan Creek, for 2 weeks and hiked Arc Dome, from the west... Never saw another soul, until the weekends... Then a few hunters would stop by, on their way to scouting for the upcoming season. They all wanted a closer look at 44.
I'm trying to get back up there, but may have to take my air conditioned Tundra...
On another note... Looks like they are paving the bottom of that big hole at 215 and Lone Mountain... 215 will apparently run under a Lone Mountain overpass.