Agency-listedCounty ConservationFree
Frenchtown Park
Drive-up · public land · IA · 42.84709, -91.10643
Ask an AI about this campsiteOpens Grok already loaded with this site. It reads the same records this page is built from, and links whatever it tells you.
Ask about this camp →The land manager 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.
A small, genuinely free primitive campground on the Mississippi about three miles north of Guttenberg, run by Clayton County Conservation. Three rough sites -- this is pack-it-in, pack-it-out camping next to a boat ramp and picnic area, not a campground with hookups. The county's own page calls it "free to all hopeful campers" and "rough camping only." Expect no electricity, no showers, and no drinking water; bring your own. The county publishes NO stay limit and NO registration process for this park, which in practice means it is informally managed -- that also makes it exactly the kind of place a county can quietly start charging for, so confirm with Clayton County Conservation (563-245-1516) before you count on it. Three sites is tiny; have a backup plan on a summer weekend. Unverified by us on the ground.
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Frenchtown Park
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 619 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Frenchtown ParkNIFC · 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 Frenchtown Park · public land · IA
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- MMechanic3 mi
- WWater4 mi
- EVEV fast charger4 mi
- FFuel4 mi
- HHardware4 mi
- LLaundry5 mi
- @Mail5 mi
- GGrocery5 mi
- DDump8 mi
- +Urgent care11 mi
- OOutfitter11 mi
- RxPharmacy14 mi
- ShShower15 mi
- PPropane31 mi
- AAir-up48 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water is basically at camp, fuel & food sit about 4 mi out.
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 — Frenchtown Park
Access
Drive-up
Land
public land
Elevation
619 ft
Ground slope
6.9% · gentle
Nearest rail line
~0.1 mi · main line
State
IA
Coordinates
42.84709, -91.10643
Cost
Free
Nearby & resupply — around Frenchtown Park · public land · IA (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureBuck Creek · ~0.5 mi · USGS: perennial stream
- Nearest townEckards · ~0.7 mi
- Nearest rail line~0.1 mi · main line
- Nearest highwayno interstate or US route within 10 mi
- Drinking waterDrinking water · ~4.1 mi
- FuelKwik Trip · ~4.5 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- Dump station~8.4 mi
- GroceriesBenders Supermarket · ~4.7 mi
- PharmacyWalgreens · ~14.3 mi
- Hospital / clinicGuttenberg Municipal Hospital · ~4.2 mi
- HardwareKeumpel Hardware · ~4.5 mi
EV charging — from Frenchtown Park · public land · IA — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger4.4 mi straight-line S — Brown's Sales and Leasing, Guttenberg, IA (at a public site) · FORD_CHARGE · CCS · 4 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: 24 hours daily · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reach2 within 25 mi · 10 within 50 · 122 within 100 · 328 within 150
- Nearest listing NACS (Tesla)13.9 mi — Prairie du Chien, WI - Tesla Supercharger, Prairie du Chien
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO31.0 mi — Richardson Motors, Dubuque
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)4.4 mi — Browns Sales and Leasing, Guttenberg, IA · Blink Network · J1772 · 1 Level 2 port 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 416843 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Frenchtown Park · public land · IA — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- RestroomFederal restroom · ~13.2 mi N · FWS
- RestroomFederal restroom · ~17.2 mi N · NPS
Coming out here — Frenchtown Park · public land · IA
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Buck Creek as a perennial stream, ~0.5 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 6.9% — 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.
- Rail line mapped ~0.1 mi from the pin — the national rail atlas classes it as a main line. That is the FRA/BTS North American Rail Network (data updated Jul 21, 2026), which records that a line is there and what class of track it is. Whether anything runs on it, how often, and at what hour, it does not say, and nobody has checked this one for you.
- No interstate or US route is mapped within 10 mi of the pin in the Census's TIGER/Line primary roads (TIGER/Line 2025, released Oct 2025). That file holds the divided, limited-access highways only — a state expressway or a two-lane US route near this camp would not be in 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 Frenchtown Park elsewhere
Other camps near Frenchtown Park
If this one is full, gated or washed out.
Who holds the land at Frenchtown Park
USGS’s Protected Areas Database (PAD-US 4.1, queried 2026-09-23) lists the ground at this pin as French Town Lake Access, manager on record: Clayton County Conservation Board (local government). That names who holds the land — it is not a statement that camping is permitted here.
How we know this — Frenchtown Park
Source
Iowa county park records
Confidence
Researched — The record is detailed and internally consistent, and the coordinates land where the managing agency says this site is.
How it was placed
Clayton County Conservation Board official site https://www.claytoncountyconservation.org/frenchtown-park -- verbatim: "This intimate park has 3 primitive sites and is free to all hopeful campers" and "Rough camping only for FREE!". Corroborated independently by OSM node 7157651019 (tourism=camp_site, fee=no) at the identical point; Nominatim resolves the same node to 26254 Mississippi Road, Guttenberg, Clayton County, IA 52052. Coordinate taken from that OSM node, not geocoded from a description. Clayton CCB's other camping parks all charge $15/night (Joy Springs, Motor Mill, Frieden), so this is a genuine outlier, not a site-wide policy. Verified 2026-07-20.
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 Frenchtown Park
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 — Frenchtown Park
Finding water out here →Fire rules & restrictions →Reading the aerial →Camping with a dog →All field notes →