Kamas, where the mountain road starts

Summit County, in its southwest corner. That matters more here than in most Utah towns, because the 84036 ZIP code around Kamas reaches across the county line into Wasatch County, where resort developments including Tuhaye, Victory Ranch, Hideout and Deer Vista all carry Kamas mailing addresses. Those places are not in the city and not in the county, and their taxes, schools and services are different, so any Kamas figure drawn from the ZIP code describes resort country as much as the town.

At the intersection of Main Street and Center Street in the middle of Kamas. State Route 150 runs 54.7 miles from there to the Wyoming state line south of Evanston, crossing Bald Mountain Pass at 10,715 feet, which is the highest paved road in Utah. The Heber-Kamas Ranger District office that sells the recreation pass for the corridor sits at 50 East Center Street, roughly a block from where the road begins.

In practice from Memorial Day weekend until the first serious autumn snow, although the snowpack decides rather than the diary. A padlocked gate takes the mountain section out of service for the whole of winter, which puts the campgrounds, the trailheads and every lake in the high country beyond reach by car for about a third of the year. The stretch between town and that gate is plowed in every season, so Kamas itself is never on the wrong side of it. The byway page carries the exact mileposts and the most recent dates.

About 16 miles west over State Route 248, roughly 22 minutes outside of resort traffic. Heber City is about 17 miles south on SR-32, about 23 minutes. Salt Lake City is around 42 miles and under an hour by way of US-40 and I-80, with the airport nearer 48 miles. High Valley Transit runs a free commuter bus between Park City and Francis through Kamas at rush hours, so check the schedule.

The town's own calendar is small and specific. Kamas Valley Fiesta Days runs for a week around Pioneer Day in late July with a rodeo, a parade, a car show, a demolition derby and fireworks, and the celebration dates to 1938. Hi-Mountain Drug on Main Street runs an old fashioned soda fountain and grill inside the drugstore. Samak Smoke House sits two and a half miles up the byway. Everything else is outdoors and most of it is up SR-150.

Inside city limits, plan on no. Kamas adopted an ordinance on 11 March 2025 that stopped any new nightly rentals, with a warning and then a 500 dollar fine for violations. Owners already operating had until 10 April 2025 to document continuous use and take out a business license, and only those operators were grandfathered. The city adopted a 1 percent transient room tax at the same time. Confirm the current ordinance with Kamas City before you write an offer.

The fee changes over time, so the honest answer is to check the current price at the source. Driving SR-150 is free. A recreation pass is required only for vehicles parked at developed Forest Service sites along the corridor, meaning trailheads, picnic areas and campgrounds. The Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest sells it in short-term and annual tiers, America the Beautiful federal passes are honored in its place, and the Heber-Kamas Ranger District office at 50 East Center Street is the nearest counter to buy one.

It is 834 acres at the entrance to town on SR-248, on both sides of the road, at the headwaters of the Weber River, which Summit County and the Summit Land Conservancy bought and closed on 15 December 2025. Conservation easements bar development, the meadows stay working agricultural ground, and about 454 acres south of the road is set aside for non-motorized recreation. The Ure family homesteaded the place in the late 1800s and chose conservation over development.

It is the base, in the literal sense that the road in starts on its Main Street and the ranger district that manages the corridor keeps its office in town. Ruth Lake, the Lofty Lake loop, the Crystal Lake trailhead cluster and the summit trail up Bald Mountain are all day hikes from a Kamas breakfast. The limit is the calendar rather than the distance: for about four months a year the gate at mile 14.6 puts every one of them behind a snowmobile ride.