Best Tent Camping near Menasha, WI

Open tent sites and well designed riggings and beyond excellent, well-maintained trails, accommodations and hospitality. This was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up, so if you’re looking for this kind of experience, don’t pass it up. In one of the most lush forests in the SE corner of Wisconsin near Milwaukee.

We were tent camping and stayed on a rustic site. Although we were 205 and it was fine, I would choose 212 and that area next time. $22 night for a rustic site; $34 for reserved with hook-ups. Plenty of clean shower and bathroom facilities and nice laundry

The tent sites at this camp ground are in the back of the campground located in the woods! There is a small pond with in the campground which you are able to swim in, kayak in and go frogging in! A play ground is present and the owner is wonderful! Very friendly place!

Stayed for the first time at this campground in July and loved it. We stayed on a tent site, it was huge and had electric. I love that the campground is right on the lake and there’s quite a few amenities for people who boat. It is pet friendly and the bathrooms are quite a walk but clean and hot water is available.

If you are looking for a place to camp with an RV or rent a cabin, this is your place! Three pools, mini golf, and a great atmosphere! However, we were tent camping and our site was gravel and right on the main road. It was very small and our tent was too close to the road for my comfort. Hiking trails weren’t very well kept, but was still a beautiful hike! If you have kids and camper I would absolutely recommend this place! Also very dog friendly!

The park itself is beautiful, and the trails are nice. The tent sites were on the smaller side and kind of close together. The park ranger was good-natured and patient when we accidentally set up on the wrong site.

Make sure to store your food correctly! The two sites beside us were ransacked by raccoons all night long because they left their supplies out. Three raccoons came to smell around our picnic table as soon as we zipped up inside the tents but left quickly after not finding food.

Campground is adequate, it has a functioning shower house and private spots. I used a primitive campsite and it cost me $30 ($15 if your from WI). That was on top of the $11 non resident park entrance fee. So $41 for a primitive tent site, $47.50 if you count the bundle of firewood I bought from them. So yeah, keep that in mind if coming here as a non resident. I’m sure there are cheaper places nearby.

This was the strangest camping experience I've ever had. It was early June and there were maybe two or three other sites set up in the entire campground. I made my reservations online for a tent site and nothing indicated that the site I selected was an overflow site. These "overflow" sites were scantly numbered, and there were fewer fire pits and picnic tables than indicated online. All of these tent sites were scattered in a grass field among the frisbee golf. We were glad no one was playing frisbee golf because it was intermixed with where the tents would be, so people would be getting hit with frisbees.

My friend and I pitched our tent closest to the bathroom because we could not find the actual spot we reserved online. We could not find anyone to ask about our site other than the waitresses at the restaurant who were very busy. We ate at the restaurant too and were unimpressed. Unless you get the day's special, it is very overpriced and the portions are small.

The bathrooms were clean (because no one else was at the campground), but there was no drinking water. We were on a bike tour and had to bike over 10 miles in the morning to find some good drinking water. I don't believe I paid $25 for something that was barely a campsite and had no drinking water.

I might of enjoyed it more if I had time to explore the area and the tower, but just dropping in for the night was not a great experience. It felt the campground only came to be because somebody wanted to open a restaurant and his buddy thought it would be a genius idea to let people camp there too.

The tent sites are a great size and semi private (you can have a conversation and not be heard at other sites). The bathroom and showers are decent and cleaned daily around 6 am. There are reservable and walk-in sites. The sites also have extra parking across from them.

There is a lot to do for kids a great play area, swimming, fishing, boating etc. There are hiking trails but not a lot.

The couple I went with had issues with the site next to them ( loud inappropriate language and using drugs) the rangers responded quickly and efficiently!

I have been there summer and late spring.

I decided to give this campsite a try to get some of my family members ate not up for tent camping. With real beds, running water and AC I figured that this would do the trick.

The cabin itself was roomy enough for five with a bunk bed, queen bed and sofa bed. Any more than that would get a little tight.

Amenities: Camp store, mini golf, three swimming pools, trails, basketball court, volleyball court, snack bar, and saloon. My kids had a blast so I would really recommend for a family who wanted to some form of cabin camping. Oh, there were goats as well!

I love campfire cooking which I was able to since there was a fire pit out back.

Also, this place has activities for family members, even a movie night. I saw groups of kids playing basketball or just hanging out and having fun. Oh, and there’s an arcade. At the saloon there was a karaoke night.

If you are more of a traditionalist then you may not like this type of camping. But, if you want to get out for the weekend with you family for a family oriented atypical getaway then this is for you!

We’ll be back.

Campground Review

High Cliff is a generally wooded and shaded campground on a cliff overlooking Lake Winnebago. The sites are average to above average size, with a good mix of electric and non-electric sites. We are tent campers and the ground was pretty flat and there was a good spot for our tents in our site. Our site was nice and spacious with a good fire-ring that had a grate that rotated. Typically I use an adjustable tripod grill, but since was a rainy weekend, it was nice to be able to not have to get that out. The one thing about our site(and the campground in general) in the rain was the mud. Since it is heavily shaded there isn't really any grass, so the ring forest floor soil turns mucky and muddy.

There is one main flush toilet/shower building in the campground, and a bunch of pit toilet buildings. The pit toilet buildings had some issues with the lights in some of them, but the shower/flush building was mostly clean and not too far away. There is also a really nice playground nearby.

Within the park are plenty of hiking/biking trails, a lookout tower, and there is beach access. The beach/water is definitely swimmable, but this isn't the most beautiful beach for swimming. When we were here, it was cool and rainy, so the most we did was put our feet in the water. There isn't much sand, but there are large grassy areas.

The weekend we were there a local theater group happened to be performing a minimal version of Romeo and Juliet. It was awesome.

Product Review

As a Ranger for The Dyrt, I get products to test from time to time, this time I got to test the Wenzel Ivanhoe 6 tent.

I've owned a bunch of tents throughout the years, but mostly they were small backpacking size tents. We have use a large 8-person Cabella's tent for the past 9 years for car camping, but it is time-consuming to set-up, so we thought the Wenzel Ivanhoe 6 would be a nice complement tent for us.

The Ivanhoe is part of Wenzel's "Tribute" collection, with a retro-inspired design. The Ivanhoe reminds me of my parents' old canvas tent. The Ivanhoe is a single-walled house-shaped tent made of weather-treated polyester and taped seams. It held up really well in the rainy weather we had camping and there was just one small area that the seam tape failed: a"troubleshooting" tag that hangs down inside the tent.

What I like:

• The single pole design is simple and quick to setup

• There is good airflow with the large screens on the doors and the two side windows; The rear vent is a nice touch

• It has a great look and it well made

• It actually fits in the bag it came in

What I don't like

• The top peak vents don't really work

• There was a slight leak by the tag (I'll use some seam-sealer to fix this for the future)

• Since it isn't freestanding, there are a lot of guy lines that are easy to trip over in the dark

For a sub-$200 tent, this tent is awesome. It's easy to set up and looks great. It is a simple design that is spacious and comfortable for 3-4 people. It did great in rainy weather. I definitely recommend this tent for for those looking for a car camping tent around this size and want to spend less than $200.

The staff was great to work with finding a campsite on a walk-in. The campsite was very clean and read for us to set up our tent. The hiking and lookouts were breath taking

I backpacked the IAT with a group and we camped for the night at Mauthe Lake at the beginning of April. There are lots of downed trees at the campground, which sort of detracted from the landscape (tornado damage, I'm told). Pit toilets were open, but water had not yet been turned on so be prepared to filter if you go this early in the season. We perused different sites/loops for a while to find adjacent non-electric sites large enough for multiple tents at each and were able to fit 8-9 (small backpacking) tents between 314 and 313.

It was a bit chilly to enjoy the lake unfortunately, but the hiking is amazing. There are great rock outcrops for bouldering and exploring. All over just beautiful. Definitely one of my favorites in Wisconsin!!

Great clean sites and fishing. Many hiking trails. Historical attractions. Wisconsin does their parks and forests right.

Mauthe lake was my very first camping experience and continues to be a go-to site for my family. Decent sized campsites with options for tents, campers, electric, etc.

Great place to explore with the fam. Hike the trails to see pieces of Wisconsin history throughout. Some trails on the Ridgeline offer vista views and moderate inclines that add to the adventure. There's plenty to do from fishing to hiking mountain biking lookout towers and parks .

Large sites great for groups. Sites 2 and 9 are the largest. Those can each fit over 20 backpacking tents at the same time. Grassy sites surrounded by trees (plenty for hammocks too). Short walk to pit toilets and drinking water.

I have a self contained van and so like to camp in rustic sites. The full electric sites here are pretty small and tightly packed, but the tent / rustic sites are great. Aim for the 500 loop.

This was my first time camping in a Wisconsin state park and I thought it was great! Our site backed up to a trail along the cliff which was awesome for a family that loves to hike. I felt for a state park most of the sites were spacious, ours was particularly because we had no site behind us. Shower house was clean. Will be back!