Best Tent Camping near Loup City, NE

3 miles East of Loup City is Trade Winds campground. It is privately owned so you don’t need a state pass. It has 12 cabins and 20 Rv/tent sites with electricity and shared water. The sites are very close together but have shade trees. Each site is back in with picnic bench and fire rings. There is a nice marina for food,bait, supplies. And it has a grill open on weekends. There is a coin operated shower house and laundry mat area. The Marina also has kayak, boat slip, and storage for rent. Everyone there seems to be nice. They even had a huge firework display.

This is a nice site with electric and tent sites. Each site has fire ring and there are vault toilets around the site. There are tent site that are free. You can camp there off season. Some of the site are on the river. There are also several hiking trails.

I grew up in the towns next to the Davis Creek Dam which is managed by the NRD. This is a great , once upon a time small campground right on Davis Creek Dam. You’ll enjoy this campground that is far away from road noise. Supplies can be purchased in North Loup, Scotia or Ord Nebraska, roughly 6 and 16 miles way respectively. This campground gets busy over summer holidays but other than that I’ve found that you can reserve same day spots without worry, especially if you are tent camping.

The TENT sites are closed for COVID-19 social distancing, but the RV sites are OPEN. The concrete pads are well maintained, spaced accordingly, and easy to pull into for a variety of RV hook-ups.

The restroom by the main entrance was the ONLY open bathroom. It is wheelchair accessible & clean!

There are pump well water stations in the park. Many places to picnic and enjoy the fall weather.

I’m on a cycling trip across the USA, and I’ve stayed at 60 campsites and this was the best so far, by a long way. For the following reasons: the whole park is beautifully landscaped and maintained. The tent area is spacious, lots of shade, very soft grass, and a few picnic tables and BBQ stands. It’s $15 for tent camping. Excellent shower with lots of hot water. Finally, it’s very quiet and peaceful. A few things to note: the pay station and registration place is half a mile from the tent area in the RV area. There is only one shower, which is near to the RV area and takes quarters ($1 for 6 minutes). There’s an automatic gate that closes at 20:30, after which I don’t think you can get in to the park (but no 100% sure about that). Overall, highly highly recommended!

Victoria Springs has 2 different areas for camping. One area is for tent camping ($15 a day) and has a small lake with paddle boats to use. The lake has an algae issue right now. This area has a picnic shelter and playground that is dated. There are 2 cute cabins available for rent which have fire rings and picnic tables. The other area is for RVs and you can have electric $20)or electric and water($30). Each site has a fire ring and picnic shelter and is on grass. There is a basketball hoop that needs help and horseshoe area which is overgrown. A little bit of upkeep and elbow grease and this would be a great getaway.

After much deliberation, and with great regret, I am declaring myself a Nebraska State Parks campground anti. There are three interlocking reasons for this decision:

1. Both the campgrounds I have been to (this one and Rock Creek Station SRA) seem to treat tent sites as an afterthought: each park has a very small number of tenting spaces that are kind of on the margins of the campground. At Fort Kearny, the sites that were available were also either totally slanted or full of trash. It does seem like other parks might not share this problem, but it at least indicates a pattern to be aware of.

2. In addition to the campsite fee, there is a $12 DAILY out-of-state vehicle entrance fee. This means that a $15 campsite is actually a $27 campsite. I will say, in fairness, that the $12 also allowed my car to enter the Fort Kearny historical site next to the campground.

3. The showers are coin-operated. This isn’t a cost problem so much as it is a logistical one: who has quarters anymore? Also, because the showers are timed, you can’t turn the water off and back on again, which ruins my entire haircare routine.

Obviously, these reasons won’t apply to everyone. If you have a camper or RV, your calculus will be totally different. If you’re in-state, and you only have to pay $6 for your vehicle instead of $12, I could see these sites being worth it. And if you don’t have hair that you need to condition, the shower thing might not bother you. But if you are like me, a long-haired out-of-state yokel trying to cross the country with a Honda Accord and a backpacking tent, you might take these considerations into account.

I will say that this campground is beautiful to drive through, with all the little lakes and the cottonwood trees. Also, the camp hosts offer free bikes for guests to use around the campground and presumably on the nearby hike/ bike trail, which is very kind of them and which I wish I had time to take advantage of.

Campground Review: Bader Park is located in Merrick County a few miles from Marquette Nebraska. It has 24 Rv sites with Electric at $20/night and over 15 tent sites at $10/night, along with lots of day use areas. Everyone also needs to purchase a $6/day vehicle pass. It is a smaller campground with acres of prairie wetlands and miles of trails. There are picnic areas with grills scattered throughout and a group picnic shelter. The showers are coin operated, make sure you bring shower sandals. We were the only campers there except the campground hosts. It was quite chilly in the evenings, but enjoyed sitting out by the campfire looking up at the full moon and stars. You only heard nature around you…the leaves rustling as they blew in the wind, the crickets and frogs singing and the coyotes chattering in the distance. So very relaxing.

Bader Park has a swimming beach with a sandvolleyball net, and multiple fishing ponds. During the year they have fun activities for children and adults including Bird/Nature hikes, a Haunted forest, and Haunted Halloween Campgrounds.

Product Review: As a Ranger for The Dyrt, I get products to test from time to time and I tested the Primus Trailbottle at Bader Park. What I love about the 1.0L(33.8 oz) Trail bottle:

1. It's stainless steel with powdered coating. I chose black and it wow it looks sharp, but it has other color options. It also stay cold for hours.
2. I use it for flavored water and was excited that it didn't retain the flavors from previous drinks.
3. It is dishwasher safe and if you choose to wash it in the sink the opening is larger which makes it easy to get a brush in there to clean. It also makes it easier to get ice in.

4. I love that it is light weight and easily fits in the pocket of my backpack. It also comes with a. a strap on lid so it doesn't get lost and you can strap it on to your backpack.

I give The Primus Trail Bottle 5 stars as it meets and exceeds my expectations. Take a look at all the Primus products at https://www.primus.eu/

Davis creek is a 67 camp site (25 primitive/2 ADA, 42 electric/3 ADA) nestled in rolling hills of Valley county Nebraska on the Davis Creek reservoir.  Camping is permitted year round although water is only available April 1 to November 30th.  There is also a camp host in the RV section from April-Nov.  There are no established trails for hiking but the gravel roads throughout the camp are used for walking and bike riding.  

This is a lake and campground that went from very primitive just over 20 years ago to a top notch natural resource district campground and recreation area.  The NRD is investing heavily in this campground with large shelters, shower house (bring quarters), 2 boat ramp areas, large fish cleaning station, ADA ramps, fishing docks, and a small swimming beach.  The rumor from the locals is that the entire campground will be electric in the near future.  I was really impressed to find free WiFi added in 2019!  The WiFi was strong and reliable everywhere in the campground.  

I camped on site 72 which is an electrical site capable of facilitating smaller RV’s, campers or tents.  Site 72 was near water, a brick restroom building and the shower building.  You’ll be hard pressed to find any adequate shade at any of the sites here although the row of 60’s will offer some late day/evening shade.  All of the sites have very nice concrete pads with large fire rings with grilling grates in addition to large concrete pads with picnic tables.  There is plenty of green space at most sites and at 72 we set up horseshoe stakes and had all the room we needed.  

The lake:  we took our kayaks out and did some fishing on this campout.  Access to the lake is easy with nice wide boat ramps at two different let in’s.  This is a popular fishing and water sport lake that does allow skiing and high speed water sports.  If you like to fish I recommend going to the inlet a couple of miles North of the campground, it seems to be the most popular spot for on water and shore-line fishing.  We trolled lines behind our kayaks and caught white bass on this Memorial Day weekend in 2019.  

ADA site:  There was a really nicely designed ADA site next to site 72 that I think is worth mentioning here.  The site was flat with a concrete path that connected the site to the walking path to the restrooms.  The fire ring and picnic table were also designed for those wheelchair bound.  I’ve attached some pictures below.  If you have disabilities you’ll have access to everything you need at this campground.

Lots of work and upgrades in progress to facilities like bath house and hook ups etc. Porta-Potties available and free remnant firewood boxes for fire rings. Picnic tables metal wire on cement slabs. RV pull thru on gravel. Easy to call for details and upgrade status; nice staff. Peaceful Camping. Spent two nights for Nebraska Junk Jaunt.

Love Victoria Springs! It is a hidden gem in the Nebraska Sandhills.  It fills up on the weekends but during the week you can have the entire campground to yourself.  Beautiful trees, nice shade, and electrical hook-ups.

Did a quick overnight visit here driving through Nebraska. It was a little too close to the interstate for my taste and it could have been a little cleaner, but overall was a nice enough campground and conveniently located. I'd stay there again under similar circumstances but probably not as a getaway location.

I've stayed 3 times at the Fort Kearney SRA for convenience only.  Nebraska Game & Parks has a punitive price model that charges out-of-state visitors $12/day to enter a park with a campground (no Senior discounts either) and then $15/day for a primitive campsite (no water or electric) that is a looong ways for the dirty and rundown restrooms.

Nice camp ground with helpful gate attendants, this Nebraska park represents the conundrum of many public campgrounds. Here, there are plentiful showers (yes, 75 cents for three minutes, woopdeedoo) but no water spigots and few usable pit toilets. There are primitive sites, 30 amp (yellow) and 50 amp (red) sites so no generator noise and all sites are near stocked ponds. A mix of overnight and long term visitors. Sandhills cranes can be viewed in the adjacent corn stubble in April. Limited cell service and no WiFi