Agency-listedNGPCFee

Calamus Reservoir SRA

Drive-up · Nebraska Game & Parks · NE · 41.85424, -99.26009

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Nebraska Game & Parks lists this site. Someone from the agency inventoried it, so it is a real camp — not a spot we guessed at. What changes is conditions — roads, gates, closures, fire rules. Check those with the unit before you commit to the drive.

Nebraska State Recreation Area (NGPC), Garfield & Loup County. The park's own page says: "Calamus SRA offers Electric Plus and Basic camping spread over three campgrounds. Shower houses are available at Homestead Knolls, Nunda Shoal and Valley View Flat campgrounds. All three areas offer mature shade trees, water and modern restrooms and each area is within walking distance of the lake. A dump and fill station is available at Little York Point. Additionally, camping is permitted in the parking lots of the Valley View Flat and Hannaman Bayou campgrounds in designated spots. Hannaman Bayou and Valley View Flat campgrounds offer Basic non-pad campsites with access to water, restrooms and shower houses. There is a group campground that accommodates up to eight tents in the Valley View Flat Campground. Reservations are available for this area. Beach camping is not permitted at Calamus SRA. Camping reservations are available during peak season for half of the electrical campsites up to 180 days in advance. All other camping is all first-come, first-served; campers must register their nightly camping fees in a raised, locked box called an Iron Ranger. Self-service envelopes are provided at each station and accept cash or checks only." The park's own page lists 'water' among campground amenities without saying whether it is potable. Confirm on site; treat all natural water as NOT potable. NOTE FOR REVIEW: our map already carries 'Calamus Reservoir WMA' about 1.44 mi away (published) -- check these are genuinely different places to camp.

USGS topo — contours & terrain

USGS topographic map of Calamus Reservoir SRA

Aerial — USGS / NAIP

Weather outlook — at Calamus Reservoir SRA

Loading the latest forecast…

Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 2,274 ft.

Fire & smoke — around Calamus Reservoir SRANIFC · AirNow

Checking active fires & air quality…

Active wildfires from NIFC (within ~50 mi); air quality from AirNow. Always confirm current fire restrictions with the managing office before you go.

Everything you need — measured from Calamus Reservoir SRA · Nebraska Game & Parks · NE

▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.

Nearest of each

@Mail8 mi
FFuel9 mi
GGrocery9 mi
HHardware24 mi
MMechanic37 mi
RxPharmacy52 mi
+Urgent care52 mi
EVEV fast charger53 mi
AAir-up54 mi

≤30 mi30–4545+water

The read: fuel & food sit about 9 mi out, the nearest EV fast charger is a 53-mi run (and back).

Not within 60 mi: Water, Dump, Propane. Plan those before you head up.

One dot per need — the nearest of each kind, straight-line from camp. Places from OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors); the EV fast charger from the US DOE station locator. Open in Google Maps ↗

The site — Calamus Reservoir SRA

Access

Drive-up

Land

Nebraska Game & Parks

Elevation

2,274 ft

Ground slope

3.3% · gentle

State

Coordinates

41.85424, -99.26009

Cost

Fee

Nearby & resupply — around Calamus Reservoir SRA · Nebraska Game & Parks · NE (OpenStreetMap)

Water featureCalamus Reservoir · ~0.2 mi · USGS: perennial lake or pond
Drinking waternone within 10 mi
FuelConoco · ~8.6 mi
Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
GroceriesConoco · ~8.6 mi
HardwareQuick's Ace Hardware · ~24.4 mi
Rail & highwaynone mapped within 10 mi

EV charging — from Calamus Reservoir SRA · Nebraska Game & Parks · NE — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)

Nearest public DC fast charger52.6 mi straight-line NE — NPPD EV STATION ONEILL CUB DCSW, O'Neill, NE · ChargePoint Network · CHAdeMO, CCS · 1 fast port listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: 24 hours daily · directions
Public DC fast stations within reachnone within 25 mi · none within 50 · 32 within 100 · 61 within 150
Nearest listing NACS (Tesla)79.1 mi — Lexington, NE - Tesla Supercharger, Lexington
Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)23.1 mi — AIRPORT MOTEL AIRPORT MOTEL, Ord, NE · ChargePoint Network · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: 24 hours daily
Pricing at the fast chargernot listed
Power (kW)not listed by AFDC — “DC fast” spans roughly 24 to 350 kW, so ask the network.
Read this honestlyStraight-line miles, like every distance on this site. Roads run longer than this, and you have to get back. We know where a charger is listed. We don’t know if it works today, how fast it is, or the road miles. Check the network before you commit.
Snapshot 2026-09-16 · AFDC record 319692 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center

Nearby restrooms — around Calamus Reservoir SRA · Nebraska Game & Parks · NE — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)

Vault / pit toiletNunda Shoal Boat Ramp Vault Toilet Building · ~0.9 mi NW · BoR
Vault / pit toiletNunda Shoal Vault Toilet 2 Building · ~1.1 mi NW · BoR
Vault / pit toiletNunda Shoal Vault Toilet 1 Building · ~1.1 mi NW · BoR
Vault / pit toiletBuckshot Bay Boat Ramp Vault Toilet Building · ~1.3 mi SE · BoR

Coming out here — Calamus Reservoir SRA · Nebraska Game & Parks · NE

Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Calamus Reservoir as a perennial lake or pond, ~0.2 mi from the pin (National Hydrography Dataset, data refreshed October 2022). Mapped as perennial is not the same as flowing today. Nobody has checked it for you. Filter or boil anything you drink.
Ground slope around the pin: about 3.3% — gentle. Measured on USGS's 3DEP elevation model (1 m data here), sampled every 10 metres around the point. That is the hillside, not the ground under your wheels — a graded pullout or a bench a few metres across is too small to show up at that spacing, and nobody has checked this one for you.
No rail line and no interstate or US route is mapped within 10 mi of the pin. Checked against the FRA/BTS North American Rail Network (data updated Jul 21, 2026) and the Census's TIGER/Line primary roads (TIGER/Line 2025, released Oct 2025). Both are national files and both are maps of what is built, not counts of what moves on it.
Power: Dave carries his own — batteries or solar. A generator will run your rig and it is also the thing everybody camped near you can hear.
Getting online: Dave recommends Starlink. He has had it since SpaceX introduced it, used it for four years living on the road, and it delivers as promised — several hundred nights out, and he can count on one hand the places he could not connect. The cable on his unit runs 150 feet, which is usually all it takes to find enough sky. Starlink → Referral link — Starlink pays Dave $100 in cash if you sign up through it, and that money funds this site and the next trip. It costs you nothing and does not change the recommendation.

Open Calamus Reservoir SRA elsewhere

Google satellite →Gaia GPS →CalTopo →Back to the map →

Other camps near Calamus Reservoir SRA

If this one is full, gated or washed out.

How we know this — Calamus Reservoir SRA

Permit

A valid park entry permit is required for all vehicles entering a state park area. Nebraska licensed vehicle: daily permit $7, annual permit $35. Non-Nebraska licensed vehicle: daily permit $14, annual permit $70.

Source

Nebraska Game & Parks (state parks and recreation areas)

Confidence

Agency-confirmed — The managing agency's own record names this as a campsite and puts it at these coordinates. About as good as it gets short of standing here.

How it was placed

Camping confirmed on the park's own NGPC page, https://outdoornebraska.gov/location/calamus-reservoir/, read 2026-08-17. Point from the NGPC Parks_Locations FeatureServer (https://services5.arcgis.com/IOshH1zLrIieqrNk/arcgis/rest/services/Parks_Locations/FeatureServer/0), the layer behind the agency's Public Access Atlas; it is a park-level point and may not sit on the campground loop. NGPC statewide rates, https://outdoornebraska.gov/parks/park-pricing/ (read 2026-08-17): camping Primitive $10/night year-round, Basic $15, Electric $25, Electric Plus $30, Full Hookup $35; off-season (roughly mid-Oct to Apr) all tiers $5 less except primitive, which stays $10. A park entry permit is required on top of the camping fee: $7/day or $35/year on a Nebraska-plated vehicle, $14/day or $70/year otherwise. Lake McConaughy and Smith Falls are the two parks priced off this card. Stay limits are posted per park -- several NGPC pages state 14 consecutive days in any 30-day period; confirm on site. Modern facilities (showers, dump/fill, full hookups) are generally closed mid-Oct through April. | auto:agency-trust 2026-08-18: state agency GIS record with a source URL and coordinates, confidence not low. Fee value is the agency's own, not field-checked. Not field-verified -- confirm access, road conditions and fire rules before you go. | nightshift-verified 2026-08-18: RE-FETCHED the park page https://outdoornebraska.gov/location/calamus-reservoir/ today (HTTP 200) and it STILL states camping. Camping detail read off that page today: Electric Plus and Basic camping spread over three campgrounds; Hannaman Bayou and Valley View Flat offer Basic non-pad sites with access to water, restrooms and shower houses; group campground for up to 8 tents at Valley View Flat; camping also permitted in designated parking-lot spots. Beach camping is NOT permitted. NGPC statewide rates were NOT re-read this fire; the rate text already in this note dates from 2026-08-17 and should be re-checked before it is quoted on a page.

EV chargers

US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center station locator, snapshot 2026-09-16. Straight-line miles to the nearest public, open, unrestricted station; restricted and planned units are shown but never counted.

Field check

On the agency's books. The land manager inventoried this site, so its existence is not in question — current conditions are. Nobody from here has camped it recently.

What we don’t know about Calamus Reservoir SRA

A land record can put you within a few meters of a spot. It cannot tell you any of this — so check it yourself, and treat anything below as the open question it is.

Road surface & last-mile access
How many rigs actually fit
Cell coverage by carrier
Seasonal & winter access
Current fire restrictions
Whether any water here is drinkable
Shade & wind exposure
Noise and who else shows up
Whether a listed EV charger works today, or the road miles to it

Before you go — Calamus Reservoir SRA

Camping near a reservoir →Water on public land →Dumping grey & black →Reading your camp page →All field notes →

Is this page wrong about Calamus Reservoir SRA?

This page was built from a public land record, not from a visit. If you have actually pulled in here and it does not match, that is worth more than anything we can read off a map. Tell Dave what is off — it goes to him, not onto the page.

Anything else, in your own words (optional)Your email — optional, and only so Dave can ask you a follow-up. It does not go on a list, and nobody is promising you a reply.

A reader report is not a fact, and this one will not change a word of this page by itself. Dave reads it and checks it against the agency’s own record, because that record is what this site says. If reader reports are ever shown here they are labelled “reader report, unverified” with the date, and they are never merged into the agency fields.