Looking for the best pet-friendly campgrounds near Yankton? Finding a place to camp in South Dakota with your dog is easier than ever. The Dyrt can help you find the perfect pet-friendly campsites that are scenic and easy to access.
$26 - $34 / night
Nebraska Tailwaters Campground is nestled along the Nebraska bank of the Missouri River, is a fun-filled camping destination just downstream of Gavins Point Dam and Lewis & Clark Lake.__The 31,400-acre Lewis & Clark Lake and Gavins Point Dam are nestled in the golden, chalkstone-lined valley of the Missouri River growing into one of the most popular recreation destinations in the Great Plains. For more information, please visit the Gavins Point Project Website.
Located just below Gavins Point Dam in the dam "Tailwaters" provides exceptional access to the Missouri River. A large 2-lane boat ramp, large parking area is available, along with an accessible fishing pier and many areas for bank fishing. The Lewis and Clark Lake area attracts more than 2 million visitors each year to its shores. Recreation opportunities around the lake include camping, fishing, hunting, hiking, boating, sailing, swimming, bird-watching, and photography. For the biking and hiking enthusiasts, three trails are available in the area. They include a paved trail that runs from Yankton to the Gavins Point area, a multi-use trail in the Gavins Point area and the Calumet Bluff hiking trail located near the visitor center. Wintertime activities include ice fishing, cross-country skiing, snowmobiling and sledding. Developed public parks and recreation areas surround the lake above and below Gavins Point Dam. Camping facilities provided by the Corps and the States of South Dakota and Nebraska include boat ramps, picnic areas, campsites with electricity, modern restrooms, playground equipment and trailer dump stations.
The campground sits on the south bank of the Missouri River, along the tailwaters of Gavins Point Dam. Surrounding the area is the golden, chalkstone-lined Missouri River Valley.__Nebraska Tailwaters is known for its exceptional Bald Eagle viewing year-round, along with many other birds of prey.
For facility specific information, please call (402) 667-2546.
The Lewis and Clark Visitor Center , exhibits on Missouri River and area history including the Lewis and Clark Expedition with stunning views of Lewis and Clark Lake along with the Missouri River. Powerhouse Tours are available on weekends. Please contact the Lewis and Clark Visitor Center at (402) 667-2546 for more information. The Gavins Point National Fish Hatchery and Aquarium Visit nearby Yankton, South Dakota - the historic capitol of the Dakota Territory.
Reservation changes and cancellations can be made on Recreation.gov or by calling 1-877-444-6777. For more information on rules and policies regarding reservation cancellations and changes, please visit: https://www.recreation.gov/rules-reservation-policies.
$35 / night
Cottonwood Recreation Area is located just downstream of Gavins Point Dam and Lewis & Clark Lake along the western shore of Lake Yankton. The numerous outdoor recreational opportunities attract more than 2 million visitors annually to the Lewis & Clark Lake area, making it one of the most popular recreation destinations in the Upper Great Plains.__Lewis & Clark Lake is 31,400-acres in size with more than 90 miles of shoreline is impounded by Gavins Point Dam, which was authorized by the Flood Control Act of 1944, commonly called the Pick-Sloan Plan. For more information about Lewis and Clark Lake, please visit the Gavins Point Project website .
Cottonwood Recreation Area is conveniently located between Lewis and Clark Lake and Lake Yankton. Lewis and Clark Lake is known for great boating, sailing, swimming and other water-based recreation activities. Lake Yankton is popular with families as a popular fishing spot along with the excellent kayaking, canoeing and paddling opportunities. Numerous paved, multi-use trails connect the area with the additional numerous recreation areas located along Lewis and Clark Lake, Lake Yankton and the Missouri River.__Lewis and Clark Lake attracts more than 2 million visitors each year to its shores. Recreation opportunities around the lake include camping, fishing, hunting, hiking, boating, sailing, swimming, bird-watching, and photography. For the biking and hiking enthusiasts, three trails are available in the area. They include a paved trail that runs from Yankton to the Gavins Point area, a multi-use trail in the Gavins Point area and the Calumet Bluff hiking trail located near the visitor center. Wintertime activities include ice fishing, cross-country skiing, snowmobiling and sledding. Developed public parks and recreation areas surround the lake above and below Gavins Point Dam. Camping facilities provided by the Corps and the States of South Dakota and Nebraska include marinas, boat ramps, trails, campsites with electricity, modern restrooms, playground equipment and trailer dump stations.
Cottonwood Recreation Area is located in the in the lush golden chalkstone-lined Missouri River Valley. Many visitors to the lake area prefer to stay at Cottonwood because of the calmer, quieter waters of Lake Yankton, a much smaller lake of approximately 250-acres in size - versus the much larger Lewis and Clark Lake upstream of the dam.__Lake Yankton provides excellent habitat for a variety of waterfowl and other bird species. The area abounds with wildlife including Whitetail Deer, turkeys, and other game species. Bald Eagles and other birds of prey are spotted by visitors regularly due to the great fishing opportunities available year-round.
For facility specific information, please call (402) 667-2546.
The Lewis and Clark Visitor Center: Contains exhibits on the Missouri River and area history including the Lewis and Clark Expedition with stunning views of Lewis and Clark Lake along with the Missouri River. Powerhouse Tours are available on weekends. Please contact the Lewis and Clark Visitor Center at (402) 667-2546 for more information. The Gavins Point National Fish Hatchery and Aquarium Visit nearby Yankton, South Dakota - the historic capitol of the Dakota Territory. Located both upstream and downstream of Lewis and Clark Lake, visit the Missouri National Recreational River .
Reservation changes and cancellations can be made on Recreation.gov or by calling 1-877-444-6777. For more information on rules and policies regarding reservation cancellations and changes, please visit: https://www.recreation.gov/rules-reservation-policies.
$20 / night
With its 146 campsites and ten camping cabins, Chief White Crane is a great place for groups to gather to spend the weekend. Combined with its own facilities and the features of the other two state parks nearby, Lewis & Clark and Pierson Ranch, visitors can take advantage of a wide variety of recreation opportunities. Chief White Crane is one of the South Dakota state parks that offers the opportunity for visitors to see the majestic bald eagle.
$8 - $55 / night
$15 - $35 / night
Lewis and Clark held council with the Yankton Sioux near the site of this KOA next to the Missouri River. The campground is located in Yankton, where history abounds! This KOA, with RV Sites and Tent Sites, as well as Cabins and Deluxe Cabins, is next door to the NFAA Easton Yankton Archery Complex, that includes archery ranges, a museum and NFAA headquarters. At this facility, you can hone your skills at indoor, outdoor, 3-D and Olympic archery (equipment available for rent).
At the campground, you can relax and unwind, cool off at the pool and have fun playing horseshoes, sand volleyball or basketball. Join the kids on the Jumping Pillow or playground. Fido will enjoy the dog park too! Six miles west, at Lewis and Clark Lake, you'll find opportunities for boating, sailing, fishing, Jet Skiing and kayaking, as well as swimming and sunbathing, on miles of beaches. Yankton also has some of the best pheasant, waterfowl, deer and turkey hunting in the area.
$40 - $48 / night
Come do some old-school camping, biking, kayaking, and fishing at one of our historic community parks.
Guide
Great overnight stop on our way through Nebraska. This city park has 5 RV/trailer pads with water and electric hookup. Suggested donation of $10/night. Right in the middle of the small town of Osmond. Bathrooms and playground with plenty of space to run. Just off the main road, but was quiet.
Traveler
Updated shower and toilets. Bring your quarters for shower. Views of the Missouri River were amazing. Enjoyed a hike with the interpreter. Worth a stop for sure.
Guide
Big campground along river. Sites spaced nicely apart. Some riverfront sites with view. Trees, grass, bike path. Lots to do here. We camped at #116. This part seemed less crowded. We had no neighbors. Very pleasant. Clean bathrooms and warm showers!
Guide
I found this on Campendium and google maps. It's a great little free park where you basically just park wherever. No designated spots, just park in the grass. The grass was not overgrown or anything, and there's a great little paved path that leads into town. Verizon cell service was pretty good and the park itself wasn't too crowded either. I imagine that the local county maintains it. Also tons of mulberry trees around! And be sure to go into town and pick up a breakfast sandwich and some donuts in the morning, it's a lovely walk in.
Legend
Level blacktop sites. Flat campground. Fishing, playground, nice dump station. High tree canopy, large old growth trees. Aluminum picnic tables. Commercial fire rings (not an old truck wheel). Very nice, would camp here again.
Legend
This is a very nice stop over. Sites 1 - 4 have water, electric (50, 30, 15 amp) and sewer. Those sites go for $25.00 per day. Dotes 5 - 6 are electric only and are infill sun. Site 7 is electric but has a sewer site as well. Shade found in sites 1 - 4. It is best to call ahead and make reservations. This campground stays busy.
Legend
This is a 3 site campground. 7 day maximum stay. No water, no garbage. 30 - 15 amp service only. Sites 1 and 2 are shaded until mid afternoon. Site 1 is shaded late afternoon. Locals bring their dogs out to "run." They don't pick up after, so watch your step. We are ¼ mile from highway and semi's Jake break a good deal, so it's quite until they go through. For a one lighter, this is a good cheap place to stop.
Legend
They have just recently added 4 more sites. Sites hVe 50 - 30 - 15 amp connections. Bathrooms ate across the playground. Showers at the swimming pool. Picnic house (open) has 15, 110 outlets. Site 3 offers most sun protection. The rest of the sites are sunny all day. Playground is very large for such a small village. Disk golf is also found here.
Legend
This is a busy boat put in and take out. There are 8 camping sites. No electrical, no sewer or dump station 2 water spigot. One water spigot between sites 6 - 7 and a thread on at the vault toilet. Toilets are new. Thus, clean so far. Fire rings at each site. Picnic tables at each site. Sites 2 and 3 have some shade from the sun. Sites 1, 4,5,6,7,8 are located in direct sunlight. The price when we stayed (July 2024) was $11.67. There were no other campers during our stay.
Legend
This is a nice clean campground. Full hookups. 50 - 30 - 15 amp service. Can be noisy next to busy city street. Large shade trees line between the 6 sites offered. Grills at each site, but no open fires allowed. Long cemented drives great for large rigs.
Legend
$20.00 a night gives you 30amp service. Picnic tables, grass site. There is only one grill in the campgrounds, and that was located on site L. You have to call the number pictured, and police will come and unlock your electrical box. They will also take your money if you wish to pay them directly. They spray for mosquitoes, and they were not a problem while we were there. Many local dog walkers, they leave many, many land minds around. You can have shade in the morning, but for the most part, all sites see sunshine throughout the day. Nice place. I should mention showers are free. Bathrooms are clean and just across the road from where you can camp. Dump station is also just west of the bath house.
Legend
15 campsites all pull throughs. Sites 1 - 7 are in the sun next to the road. Sites 8 - 24 are under beautiful shade treesAll have water electric and sewer hookups. 50 - 30 -15 amp service. Grills at each site. No firepits. No bathrooms. $25.00 a night. You MUST call to get electrics unlocked. Most of the campground was filled with workers. They were gone most of the day. These guys partied hard on the weekend.
Ranger
Excellent find and with electricity for only $10 a night. Pretty secluded with only one other camper. Some local traffic. Vault toilet withTP is far from where we camped and the old school toilets were a little too sketchy for me. If they were cleaned up I would have been brave enough to try. Such a beautiful place! Bugs are bad! Be prepared. Each site has picnic table and fire ring on nice concrete pad.
Legend
I would have given this nice little campground a 3-star rating, but I felt the 8 foot pads were a little bit too small. To be fair, they have placed a handful of larger pads throughout, but it would be insanely cramped for larger units to maneuver and even turn their rigs around. $15.00 per night for campers. $10.00 a night for tents. Cabins ran $35.00 a night. They did have a men's and women's toilet building (flush or hole?) the building was locked, and we couldn't use it. They have 30 amp electric, 1 location to obtain water (communal water spigot), 1 picnic table per site, and garbage buckets provided for nearly all sites. Oak trees provide shade from the sun. One has to look up, though. we saw several locations where larger dead and broken branches were just hanging on by a thread. They have 2 cabins that are available. The entire campground is an easy stones throw from the city swimming pool. There are 2 large picnic pavillions, and electricity is provided. Walking trails are available (we did not walk on them this trip). There is a lazy little creek that meanders around the outskirts of the campgrounds. Playground equipment in 3 locations for the kids. Large fields for others playing around. We didn't need a dump site, and I'm sorry, I didn't think to look to see if they had one. They may have one, and I think I would have noticed it if they had, but take this with a grain of salt. Town is just down the road a half mile or so, and most needs can be met there. Finally, I have to mention the highway ¼ mile away. Heavy semi traffic. Campgrounds are located at the bottom of a hill. Those semi's blast those Jake brakes. Over and over again. 2 days of that, and we left early and drove to a new campground. Enough was enough.
Legend
This place is great. Water available. 15, 30 amp service for free. Location is in city limits. No dump site. Great stop over location. Nearby traffic can seem heavy at times.
Legend
There is little left of this park. After each spring flood, they clean it up, but there is not much there any longer. They do have 15 and 30 amp connections in one location. Pit toilet remains destroyed due to floods. In the back corner of the park is a large area to turn around in and set up a short stay camp.
A boat ramp is available. A short walking trail is also available.
This is located next to a busy highway, and it is noisy with traffic much of the time we were there.
LegendCAMPING IS NOW ONLY ALLOWED BETWEEN MEMORIAL DAY THROUGH LABOR DAY. NO WINTER CAMPING IS ALLOWED ANY LONGER.
Gunderson Park is a nice little boondocking location just ½ mile from the downtown area of Centerville. They have 2 fire pit locations, but, after speaking with the official at city hall we found out you can camp pretty much anywhere in the park you would like.
It is free to camp here, you can stay virtually as long as you wish to according to that same official. There are no hook-ups. No bathroom facilities. No picnic tables. No playground for children. You may fish with a South Dakota license in the lazy rolling Vermillion River that skirts the park on 3 sides. They have a cement boat ramp. I will say when we stayed there the river was so low you would have had great difficulties getting a boat launched. On the west side of the park there are park benches at the beginning (or end of the walk depending on your start location) with a cemented walk way along the road to the park and the Vermillion River. It runs close to a quarter mile long with benches about half way through the walk. The city keeps this park mowed during the summer months. This is an old old park dating back to 1800's. The trees are massive and just as old providing beautiful shade. There are remnants of old stone items remaing in the park, grape vine thingy, a stone fireplace and pillars. Our stay favored us with Bald Eagle sightings. 2 hung around the trees on the other side of the river in full view, it was wonderful.
At the city park you can dump your tanks. We didn't need to so we didn't visit this location. At the four way stop sign located at the center of the town, turn west, travel one block and on the south side of the street you will find city hall. There they will tell you how to find the dump site.
This seems to be a favorite location for locals to drive through. Sometimes we found traffic through the park on the heavy side but most of the time very quiet. People are small town friendly. Population is around 900 people. Town has a grocery store, convenience store, bank, medical clinic, pharmacy, restaurant, bowling alley, auto parts store, bakery and other businesses. We noticed 4 churches in our drive around the town. At the city park they have a community swimming pool, Frisbee golf, 2 ball diamonds, tennis courts, playground equipment, volleyball courts, 2 picnic house areas and a location for 4 RV campsites with electrical plug ins [2 50 amp and 2 30 amp) for $10.00 a night with limited stay.
Traveler
Nice place to camp, clean and quiet. Not much for amenities, has a vault toilet and thats it. Good for boondocking.
Guide
Electric, water, and dump station available here. In the trees, shaded, and a short walk along a pleasant trail to the Missouri River. The trail system, which is accessible from campground, is great. We were in site 18, which is near the playground. In busier months, that part of the campground could get loud.
Guide
I stopped here, May 1 of 2024. They have completely redone this park and it is open. There were two spots that had concrete pads. The pedestals look good. There were a couple that were just gravel when I was there. It was kind of muddy and I decided to continue on and go further that day, but I would gladly have stopped there. It was $10 for the night. There is water available. The lady said that there was a dump station. I did not see it, and only stay two nights
Traveler
This was a very easy safe spot to spend the night. New sign states $10/night, second night is free. Unfortunately, I could not figure out where the city office is. According to Google it is in the corner of the park, but that looked like a shit down old car shop. Would have loved to pay since they provided electric hookups!
The previous listing that says it's by a lake is wrong, that is "Burbach Campground" this is "Burbach Park".
The camping pad can be a bit hard to see, it was covered in leaves when I got there so I didn't see it at first, but it is right at the gps location on the listing.
Ranger
Late in the season and the only person there but a very nice place with pretty views and a nice walking trail.
Guide
I had an amazing time at Newton Hills Campground in South Dakota with my family and young children. The spacious and clean facilities provided the perfect backdrop for our outdoor getaway, offering a blend of adventure and relaxation away from the city. The kids had a blast exploring the natural surroundings and participating in the family-friendly activities. This campground is a true gem for those seeking a wholesome outdoor experience.
Guide
We love coming to Lewis and Clark Recreation Area because it's clean and perfect for families! Clean beach, spacious spots for our 35' camper, and nice bathrooms and parks! Hiking options, clean water for swimming, beautiful dark skies with lots of stars. What's better?
Guide
 there are some full hook ups hear the area around here is all torn up the road in is cobblestone so it’s real bumpy. The campground is really a mess. There’s nothing here except your hook ups and he’s used to having construction workers at 600 a month so he wants to charge me 40 bucks for absolutely no amenities. This used to be a city park but now it’s private ownership. I’ve stayed here before a year or so ago and it’s kind of a big mess but the hook ups work. 
Scout
Out in the middle of basically nowhere is The Lazy H RV park. The park is excellent! It's probably the cleanest park I've ever been to. The concrete pads are level and large. The grass and spacing between spots is wonderful. The staff is VERY friendly. Can't wait to go back.
TravelerWell spaced and clean RV sites. RV sites located in a paved loop road that my kids loved cycling around. Short walk or bike ride to the lake which had a great beach, fishing pier, and picnic area. Pretty busy in the picnic area with family parties and people taking boats out of the water. Preferred to stay tucked away at RV site. The dump station was really busy in the morning to plan accordingly.
Frequently Asked Questions
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According to TheDyrt.com, the most popular dog-friendly campground near Yankton, SD is Yankton — Lewis And Clark Recreation Area with a 4.9-star rating from 18 reviews.
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