Elkader City Park

I had good Verizon signal here (70 down, 20 up) but zero T-mobile signal.

The campground is close to down, there are two museums within walking distance (just steps from the campground entrance). Across the street is a walking & biking trail that will take you straight to downtown, where you'll find a coffee shop, a few restaurants, and other shopping. It's less than a 5 minute bike ride to get there, and very scenic as it follows the river.

The facilities are newer and pretty nice. The showers are the single-button kind with no temperature adjustment. If you wait a while, the water does get barely warm enough for a comfortable shower.

This is not a quiet campground, it has a well traveled highway on one side, and a city main street on the other side that semi trucks use during the day. Sometimes there are highschool football games at the stadium next to the campground. Late at night it does get quiet.

The sites are grass or gravel. There are electrical hookups at most sites, with water faucets spread throughout the campground. The sites are mostly shaded.

I enjoyed the George Maier Rural Heritage Center and Museum ($5 admission) and the Elkader Depot Museum (free) which are located right next to the campground.

The downside to this campground is the dump station. It is just a hole in a manhole cover. It's in a dirt/weedy area and smells terrible. It's located across the street from the campground.

This was a great surprise in a pretty little town. The campground is across the river from Elkader, up on a rise. The campground is next to the city pool and history museum, which has great exhibits and a few historic train cars to explore. The campground has hookups for RVs primarily, with a few tent sites in a grassy area next to the road. However, you can easily just get a site with hookups to be further away from the road (the sites in the middle seem to have better hammock trees, too). None of the sites have any privacy, but all have picnic tables and fire rings. The shower house is like a bunker house- seriously, it is the tornado shelter for the park and campground! It’s super clean and large, with separate toilets, showers, and changing rooms. FREE firewood!! They even provide a couple of wheelbarrows for you to haul firewood to your site. In town there is an access point for kayakers who want to play in the river at the rapids, as well as access for fishing. There is a GREAT bakery on the main corner in town- this is THE place to buy your hamburger buns (one of their biggest sellers). There is a nice cornerstone bridge crossing the river that you can walk across to view the spillway.