Agency-listedCountyFreeSeason: check first
Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson)
Drive-up · public land · MN · 44.99316, -95.96596
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.
PAY THE DONATION: overnight camping here is free of charge, but Lac qui Parle County requests a $20/night donation dropped in the payment boxes (located at each entrance and by the bathroom) -- leave it so it stays free for the next traveler. Lac qui Parle County Park is a quiet county park on the bluffs near Dawson in far-western Minnesota (physical address 2299 337th Avenue, Dawson, MN 56232). Camping is first-come, first-served, with a 9-day maximum stay, and unusually for the region the county says the park is OPEN EVERY DAY OF THE YEAR (quiet hours 10 p.m.-7 a.m.). It is PRIMITIVE camping -- a bathroom and fire rings, no electric or water hookups, so come self-contained; good for a tent or a self-contained RV. Note the county's rules: recreational fires only in the provided rings, and NO HUNTING / no firearms allowed in the park. HEADS UP ON THE PIN: this county park is not mapped as a boundary or campsite in our data (and it shares its name with the separate, DNR-run Lac qui Parle STATE Park about 5 miles northeast -- do not confuse the two), so the marker sits on the park's own access road, 337th Avenue, rather than on an exact campsite; watch for the county park signs off 337th Avenue northeast of Dawson. Rules change and we have not visited -- confirm the current rules before you go (countypark@lqpco.com or 320-598-7261).
Can I go now? — Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson) · public land · MN
Season: check first Season stated, but not plainly enough to read as a date.
public land record: “Unless otherwise noted, or to prevent damage to the roads/trails, the Park will be open each day of the year.” Read against the calendar on 2026-09-27; with JavaScript your browser re-checks it against today.
USGS topo — contours & terrain
Aerial — USGS / NAIP
Weather outlook — at Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson)
Loading the latest forecast…
Live NWS area forecast (~2.5 km grid, not elevation-corrected). Camp sits at 1,049 ft.
Fire & smoke — around Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson)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 Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson) · public land · MN
▲ your camp. Rings are 15, 30 and 60 straight-line miles; bearings are approximate and roads run longer.
Nearest of each
- ShShower5 mi
- FFuel6 mi
- GGrocery6 mi
- EVEV fast charger6 mi
- @Mail6 mi
- HHardware12 mi
- WWater24 mi
- RxPharmacy25 mi
- MMechanic25 mi
- DDump32 mi
- AAir-up39 mi
- LLaundry40 mi
- +Urgent care46 mi
- OOutfitter48 mi
≤30 mi30–4545+water
The read: water is a real 24-mi drive, fuel & food sit about 6 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 — Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson)
Access
Drive-up
Land
public land
Elevation
1,049 ft
Ground slope
4.3% · gentle
Nearest rail line
~5.8 mi · main line
State
MN
Coordinates
44.99316, -95.96596
Cost
Free
Nearby & resupply — around Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson) · public land · MN (OpenStreetMap)
- Water featureLac qui Parle River · ~0.2 mi · USGS: perennial river
- Nearest townLac qui Parle · ~3.0 mi
- Nearest rail line~5.8 mi · main line
- Nearest highwayno interstate or US route within 10 mi
- Drinking waternone within 10 mi
- FuelFuel · ~8.1 mi
- Propane / LPGnone within 31 mi
- GroceriesStore · ~12.3 mi
- PharmacyCanby Drug & Gifts · ~24.8 mi
- Hospital / clinicJohnson Memorial Health Services · ~6.5 mi
- HardwareHardware Hank · ~12.3 mi
EV charging — from Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson) · public land · MN — nearest public DC fast & Level 2 (US DOE station data)
- Nearest public DC fast charger5.8 mi straight-line SW — Dawson · CHARGELAB · CHAdeMO, J1772, CCS · 2 fast ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: not listed · directions
- Public DC fast stations within reach1 within 25 mi · 6 within 50 · 47 within 100 · 232 within 150
- Nearest listing NACS (Tesla)39.4 mi — Marshall, MN - Tesla Supercharger, Marshall
- Nearest public Level 2 (J1772)5.5 mi — Lee Motor Company, Dawson, MN (at a public site) · RED_E · J1772 · 2 Level 2 ports listed · listed open, last confirmed by AFDC 2026-09-16 · hours: not listed
- 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 455679 · US DOE Alternative Fuels Data Center
Nearby restrooms — around Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson) · public land · MN — pit toilets, restrooms & rest areas (government data)
- RestroomFederal restroom · ~22.5 mi NW · FWS
- RestroomFederal restroom · ~24.6 mi NW · FWS
- RestroomFederal restroom · ~25.9 mi NW · FWS
- RestroomFederal restroom · ~28.0 mi NW · FWS
Coming out here — Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson) · public land · MN
- Surface water mapped nearby: USGS maps Lac qui Parle River as a perennial river, ~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 4.3% — 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.
- Rail line mapped ~5.8 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 Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson) elsewhere
How we know this — Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson)
Fire rules
Recreational fires are permitted only in fireplaces or fire rings provided for that purpose.
Open season
Unless otherwise noted, or to prevent damage to the roads/trails, the Park will be open each day of the year.
Stay limit
9 nights (No campers or tents will be allowed to stay in the park for more than nine (9) days)
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
FREE STATUS IS OFFICIAL (donation-based) and HIGH confidence via the COUNTY'S OWN board-adopted rules. "Lac qui Parle County Park Rules and Regulations, ADOPTED BY COUNTY BOARD 11/1/2022", the PDF linked from the county park page https://www.lqpcomn.gov/263/County-Park at https://www.lqpcomn.gov/DocumentCenter/View/166/County-Park-Rules-and-Regulations (both fetched 2026-07-22), states verbatim: "Short term recreational camping is allowed in the Park on a first come first serve basis. No campers or tents will be allowed to stay in the park for more than nine (9) days"; "A $20.00 donation is requested for each night you stay in the Park. Payment boxes are located at each entrance and by the bathroom"; "the Park will be open each day of the year. Quiet time in the Park will be from 10:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m." (year-round); recreational fires only in provided rings; NO HUNTING/no firearms in the park. A REQUESTED DONATION (not a mandatory fee) => fee=0 under the free-only policy. County park physical address 2299 337th Avenue, Dawson, MN 56232; office 600 6th St, Madison; contact countypark@lqpco.com / 320-598-7261. COORDINATE CAVEAT (why confidence='med'): OpenStreetMap maps NO camp_site/park/boundary object for Lac qui Parle COUNTY Park. NAME-COLLISION TRAP AVOIDED -- Nominatim resolves the string "Lac qui Parle County Park" to LAC QUI PARLE STATE PARK (a different, DNR-run place ~5 mi NE at ~45.02,-95.89); that pin was NOT used. The only authoritative OSM object at the park is its named access road "337th Avenue" (OSM way 18129188, residential, lon ~-95.9659, lat 44.9787-44.9932), which MATCHES the street in the county's official address (2299 337th Avenue). The US Census geocoder could not match the rural address; a crowd coordinate (The Dyrt, 44.99655,-95.97576) independently places the park ~0.5 mi NW of that road's north end. The pin 44.993157,-95.965958 is placed ON the mapped 337th Avenue access road (its north node, the authoritative point nearest the independent crowd fix) -- the park's own named road, NOT a mapped campsite point. Free-status HIGH, pin-precision MED. Overpass via maps.mail.ru mirror (overpass-api.de/kumi 504'd). Not visited. Verified 2026-07-22. | 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.
Season
Read from the agency's own season / closure text in this record (data/conditions.py) and checked against the calendar. The words we read are printed under the verdict at the top of the 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 Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson)
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.
- Whether the fire rule stated above still stands today — what we have is a dated reading of the agency's listing, not a live restriction feed
- Road surface & last-mile access
- How many rigs actually fit
- Cell coverage by carrier
- 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 — Lac qui Parle County Park (Dawson)
Finding water out here →Dumping grey & black →Cold-weather camping →Reading the aerial →All field notes →