What state was Lonesome Dove filmed in? The cowboys' cabin from the final episodes still stands by the road
Lonesome Dove's cattle drive runs from Texas to Montana, but the miniseries never went near Montana. Here's where it was filmed, which ranches stood in for which states, and where the cabin from the final episodes still stands.
Two states: Texas and New Mexico. Montana was played by northern New Mexico, and the cabin Call's men build at the end of the drive is still there.
Lonesome Dove, the 1989 CBS miniseries adapted from Larry McMurtry's novel, follows Gus McCrae (Robert Duvall) and Woodrow Call (Tommy Lee Jones) driving a herd from the Rio Grande to Montana in the 1870s. Production started in Texas in April and May 1988 and then moved to New Mexico.
The Texas locations
The town of Lonesome Dove, which McMurtry invented and placed on the Rio Grande, was built on the Moody Ranch, about seven miles south of Del Rio, Texas. The producers chose it for its borderland brush: mesquite, prickly pear and the rest of the south Texas scrub. The ranch also supplied several hundred head of cattle and some of the horses for the remuda.
The rest of the Texas shoot included:
- Alamo Village, Brackettville — Happy Shahan's old-time movie set, which hosted several scenes.
- Austin — listed among the production's Texas locations.
Most of the miniseries was shot at the Moody Ranch.
The New Mexico locations
The drive north was mostly filmed around Santa Fe and in the mountains of northern New Mexico:
- Bonanza Creek Ranch and Eaves Movie Ranch — two working movie ranches outside Santa Fe.
- Cook Ranch, Galisteo — another ranch location in the Santa Fe area.
- San Ildefonso and Santo Domingo pueblos.
- Angel Fire and Black Lake — in the mountains of northern New Mexico, where Black Lake doubled for Montana.
Northern New Mexico is where the story's last chapter was filmed: Call's men reaching their Montana grassland, building a cabin and corrals, and settling in for the winter.
The cabin
The cabin from those final episodes survived. John and Charlotte Kimberlin's Hat Creek Ranch in northern New Mexico, which shares its name with the story's Hat Creek Cattle Company, has preserved the mountain meadow and lake as they look on screen. Western Horseman reported that the Kimberlins refurbished the cabin and corrals Call's men build in the closing scenes.
Near Black Lake, at the southern end of the Moreno Valley, the cabin built for the shoot can still be seen from the road, as a photographer noted in 2020.
It sits on private ranch land, so the road is as close as most fans will get.
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