Bellevue State Park Campground

I think if we were here when it is less buggy, we would have enjoyed it much more but at the end of May, we saw a guy wearing a head net he said he wouldn’t sell to us for a$100 (and we probably would have paid it!) 

  

Be aware if you approach from the north, you will see signs for the park that say no camping! But then there is a sign that says camping is two miles down the road, however, the sign is very easy to miss, and we passed it. 

  

Sites are nice and spaced a decent bit apart. Site 15 has a nice shade tree. Bathrooms and showers are clean but there are no hooks in the bathrooms to hang towels or toiletries and the bathrooms are separate from the showers. The building has a cement walkway around it but you have to walk through the grass to get there. 

  

There are beautiful overlooks of the Mississippi River from paved walking trails. The camp hosts were very friendly.

Buggy but beautiful

We were just passing through the area south of Dubuque and stayed here on a rainy night. Camping is in the Dyas unit, but there are a few trails and a butterfly garden in the Nelson unit (down the road) but no camping. The butterfly garden was suffering a bit from neglect in August.

It was a decent place to stay for a night, but sites were kinda tight, i.e. close to each other. It's still a bargain at $11/$16 for non-electric/electric sites from 5/1-9/30, and the cost is $6/$11 the rest of the year.

The standard amenities include:

- fire ring and picnic table at each site

- dump station and potable water

- modern bathrooms (as well as pit toilets near the road to sites 11-23...not sure why you'd use these because it's not much farther to a real bathroom)

- individual showers, i.e. a door to the outside at each shower

Be sure to check out the photo that shows the site map along with a video that shows each area on that map.

Inexpensive, small park - not too much to do

CG site atop river bluff with pads, fire rings, tables, RR, recycling, trails, shelters nearby. Sites are close to each other but plenty to do.