Agency-listedCounty ConservationFree
Herbert Gutknecht Park
Drive-up · public land · IA · 42.33372, -92.63258
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 free county roadside park in Grundy County, on Highway 175 between Morrison and Reinbeck. Grundy County Conservation's own listing says plainly: "There is no charge for overnight camping." Five designated camping areas with a hand-pumped water well, picnic tables, grills, a shelter, and a pit toilet -- no electricity and no showers. Grundy County takes no reservations at any of its camping areas, so it is first-come, first-served. Worth knowing: this is the free outlier in an otherwise paid county system -- Grundy's other campgrounds (Wolf Creek, Grundy County Lake) run $10-$20 a night -- so do not assume the free rule travels to them. The county publishes no stay limit for this park. We could only confirm the no-charge wording on one official page; call Grundy County Conservation at 319-345-2688 to confirm before you rely on it. Unverified by us on the ground.
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Herbert Gutknecht Park
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 934 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Herbert Gutknecht 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 Herbert Gutknecht 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
- @Mail2 mi
- FFuel7 mi
- MMechanic7 mi
- LLaundry7 mi
- GGrocery10 mi
- EVEV fast charger11 mi
- RxPharmacy14 mi
- +Urgent care14 mi
- HHardware15 mi
- WWater16 mi
- AAir-up16 mi
- ShShower23 mi
- DDump28 mi
- OOutfitter28 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water's a short hop out, fuel & food sit about 7 mi out.
Not within 60 mi: 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 — Herbert Gutknecht Park
Access
Drive-up
Land
public land
Elevation
934 ft
Ground slope
2.1% · flat
Nearest highway
~8.7 mi · US Hwy 20
State
IA
Coordinates
42.33372, -92.63258
Cost
Free
Nearby & resupply — around Herbert Gutknecht Park · public land · IA (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureBlack Hawk Creek · ~0.1 mi · USGS: perennial stream
- Nearest townReinbeck · ~1.8 mi
- Nearest rail linenone mapped within 10 mi
- Nearest highway~8.7 mi · US Hwy 20
- Drinking waternone within 10 mi
- FuelFuel · ~7.3 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- Dump station~27.9 mi
- GroceriesStore · ~10.4 mi
- PharmacyWalmart Pharmacy · ~14.5 mi
- Hospital / clinicGrundy County Memorial Hospital · ~6.9 mi
- HardwareBuilders Select Building Materials & Cabinetry · ~15.9 mi
EV charging — from Herbert Gutknecht Park · public land · IA — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger10.6 mi straight-line NE — Bill Colwell Ford, Hudson, IA (at a public site) · FORD_CHARGE · CCS · 4 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: Mon: 6:00am-11:00pm; Tue: 6:00am-11:00pm; Wed: 6:00am-11:00pm; Thu: 6:00am-11:00pm; Fri: 6:00am-11:00pm; Sat: 6:00am-11:00pm; Sun: 6:00am-11:00pm · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reach8 within 25 mi · 16 within 50 · 108 within 100 · 186 within 150
- Nearest listing NACS (Tesla)15.6 mi — DANDEERY-TOYOTA DDT-EXPRESS280, Cedar Falls
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO17.8 mi — Waterloo Hy-Vee, Waterloo
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)10.6 mi — Bill Colwell Ford Series charger, Hudson, IA · Blink 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 63869 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Herbert Gutknecht Park · public land · IA — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- No mapped restroom within 30 miles — plan to pack it out.
Coming out here — Herbert Gutknecht Park · public land · IA
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Black Hawk Creek as a perennial stream, ~0.1 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 2.1% — flat. 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 is mapped within 10 mi of the pin in the FRA/BTS North American Rail Network (data updated Jul 21, 2026) — abandoned, lifted and out-of-service track excluded, so a rail-trail does not count as one.
- US Hwy 20 is mapped ~8.7 mi from the pin. Straight-line, from the Census's TIGER/Line primary roads (TIGER/Line 2025, released Oct 2025) — the divided, limited-access highways, which is why a state expressway or a two-lane US route near this camp would not appear here.
- 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 Herbert Gutknecht Park elsewhere
Who holds the land at Herbert Gutknecht Park
USGS’s Protected Areas Database (PAD-US 4.1, queried 2026-09-23) lists the ground at this pin as Gutknecht Roadside Park, manager on record: Grundy 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 — Herbert Gutknecht Park
Source
Iowa county park records
Confidence
Likely — The record is good enough to put a pin on, but thin in places. Treat the details as a starting point, not gospel.
How it was placed
Grundy County Conservation Board park page on the CCB network's own portal https://www.mycountyparks.com/county/Grundy/Park/Herbert-Gutknecht-Park -- verbatim: "There is no charge for overnight camping." Page also gives 5 camping areas, hand pumped water, picnic tables, shelter, pit toilet, and locates it "between Morrison and Reinbeck at the junction of State Highway 175 and County Road T-55". CONFIDENCE HELD AT 'med' FOR TWO REASONS: (1) single official channel -- grundycountyiowa.gov refused connection (ECONNRESET) on repeated attempts, so the quote could not be corroborated on the county's own domain; (2) OSM way 351214017 names it "Gutknecht ROADSIDE Park" vs the county's "Herbert Gutknecht Park" -- same location beyond reasonable doubt (OSM way 15901155 ref='IA 175' passes ~500 m south, matching the county's junction description) but the names differ. Coordinate is a point-in-polygon-verified centroid of OSM way 351214017 (local-origin shoelace per the SD cancellation lesson; PIP test returned inside; 9-vertex polygon, bbox 42.3327-42.3346 N, -92.6347--92.6312 W). NOT an Overpass 'out center' bounding-box centre. 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 Herbert Gutknecht 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 — Herbert Gutknecht Park
Finding water out here →Fire rules & restrictions →How to read this page →Reading the aerial →All field notes →