Fort Bidwell California Map

About Fort Bidwell, California

Fort Bidwell is a locality in Modoc County, California, United States. It is a small community with a population of 180. The population density is 21.7 people per km². Fort Bidwell is located at 41.8604°N, 120.1513°W. It observes the Pacific Time (America/Los_Angeles) timezone. ZIP code: 96112.

Fort Bidwell occupies a quiet, high-desert expanse where the arid air holds the scent of sagebrush and cooling basalt. It lies 103.1 miles north-northeast of Susanville, CA (from Susanville, CA: bearing 14°T), and is situated 24.8 miles south-southeast of Lakeview. Bidwell Creek carves a persistent, silver thread through the valley floor, providing a vital pulse of water that sustains the local landscape before eventually passing near the shimmering, shallow basin of Upper Lake. To the west, the Larkspur Hills rise in jagged, shadowed silhouettes against the expansive sky, marking the boundary of a terrain defined by stark clarity rather than lush abundance. Beyond the immediate reach of the creek, the land transitions into the rugged, timbered reaches of Modoc National Forest, where the silence is broken only by the sudden, sharp shift of wind through the pines.

History lingers in the weathered wood of the old military structures, remnants of a period when Fort Bidwell functioned as a sentinel post in a vast, frontier territory. The local economy remains anchored to the rhythms of the earth, dictated by the cycles of ranching and the slow, deliberate work of agriculture that has persisted in the shadow of Coyote Flat for generations. Those who traverse the region might find a different pace of existence, perhaps hiking the remote stretches of Mill Creek Trail, where the ground beneath one's boots feels ancient and untethered from the frantic velocity of modern life. It is a place where the light at dusk turns the dry grasses to a pale, brittle gold, illuminating a geography that asks for little and offers a singular, desolate beauty to those who remain.

About This Fort Bidwell Map Page

This page provides an embedded street and satellite map of Fort Bidwell, California. Coordinates: 41.860446, -120.151339. Live weather conditions are sourced directly from the National Weather Service. Real-time local and world news feeds keep the page current.

Detailed location data for Fort Bidwell includes the ZIP code (96112), telephone area code (530), county seat of Modoc County (Alturas), and school district assignment (Surprise Valley Joint Unified School District).

Location data is drawn from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (GNIS) and cross-verified against 2020 US Census records by coordinate proximity. Population figures are sourced from the 2020 US Census.