Agency-listedLaPorte County Parks and RecreationFree
Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)
Drive-up · public land · IN · 41.26661, -86.85238
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.
Operator: LaPorte County Parks and Recreation
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 671 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)NIFC · 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 Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks) · public land · IN
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- FFuel4 mi
- GGrocery4 mi
- @Mail10 mi
- +Urgent care10 mi
- WWater12 mi
- MMechanic13 mi
- HHardware16 mi
- RxPharmacy17 mi
- PPropane17 mi
- LLaundry18 mi
- EVEV fast charger18 mi
- AAir-up18 mi
- OOutfitter24 mi
- ShShower25 mi
- DDump29 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water's a short hop out, 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 — Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)
Access
Drive-up
Land
public land
Elevation
671 ft
Ground slope
2.7% · flat
Nearest rail line
~1.2 mi · main line
State
IN
Coordinates
41.26661, -86.85238
Cost
Free
Nearby & resupply — around Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks) · public land · IN (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureKankakee River · under 0.1 mi · USGS: perennial river
- Drinking waternone within 10 mi
- FuelBP · ~3.9 mi
- Propane / LPG7-Eleven · ~17.3 mi
- Dump station~28.7 mi
- GroceriesBP Shop · ~3.9 mi
- PharmacyCVS Pharmacy · ~17.2 mi
- Hospital / clinicMidwest Center for Youth and Families · ~10.3 mi
- HardwareMenards · ~16.4 mi
- Nearest rail line~1.2 mi · main line
- Nearest highwayno interstate or US route within 10 mi
EV charging — from Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks) · public land · IN — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger18.0 mi straight-line NW — TEAM CHEVROLET, INC, VALPARAISO, IN · EV Connect · CCS · 1 fast port listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: Mon: 8:00am-6:30pm; Tue: 8:00am-6:30pm; Wed: 8:00am-6:30pm; Thu: 8:00am-6:30pm; Fri: 8:00am-5:30pm; Sat: 8:00am-4:30pm · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reach3 within 25 mi · 68 within 50 · 474 within 100 · 856 within 150
- Nearest listing NACS (Tesla)26.2 mi — Chesterton, IN - Tesla Supercharger, Chesterton
- Nearest listing CHAdeMO26.9 mi — Victory Nissan of Chesterton, Chesterton
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)15.7 mi — TROUT GLASS STATION 1, Valparaiso, IN · 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 332340 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks) · public land · IN — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- Highway rest areaTruck parking Rest Area · ~22.4 mi N
- Highway rest areaTruck parking Rest Area · ~22.5 mi N
- Highway rest areaKankakee Rest Area Northbound (I-65N, MM231) · ~22.9 mi W
- Highway rest areaKankakee Rest Area Southbound (I-65S, MM231) · ~23.0 mi W
Coming out here — Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks) · public land · IN
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Kankakee River as a perennial river, under 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 2.7% — 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.
- Rail line mapped ~1.2 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 Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks) elsewhere
Who holds the land at Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)
USGS’s Protected Areas Database (PAD-US 4.1, queried 2026-09-23) lists the ground at this pin as Kankakee River Swampland, manager on record: Indiana DNR, Fish and Wildlife Division (state). Our own record names LaPorte County Parks and Recreation as the manager. The two sources disagree, and we have not checked which is right. That names who holds the land — it is not a statement that camping is permitted here.
How we know this — Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)
Source
public land 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
NOT STATE OR FEDERAL LAND - this is a county / municipal campground. It is here because the Indiana DNR water-trail camping layer records it with fee = "No", and we currently publish nothing at all in northern Indiana. On the Kankakee River water trail. Fee attribute and coordinate both come from the IDNR "Streamside Camping" layer, https://gisdata.in.gov/server/rest/services/Hosted/Streamside_Camping_RO/FeatureServer/0 (read 2026-08-14); the fee was NOT confirmed against the operator's own page this fire, so confirm before publishing it as free. Operator reference: http://laportecountyparks.org/kankakee.html | 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.
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 Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)
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 — Kankakee Campsites (LaPorte County Parks)
Water on public land →Fire rules & restrictions →Reading your camp page →Dispersed camping tips →All field notes →