Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake)
This place has sites and nobody may sleep in them.Ask for camping here →
- Right now
- Taking bookingsSites offered on 28 of the next 30 nights read 16:15 UTC
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 1 notices
In the agency’s own words
Bluffview is an excellent location for boating and fishing near Mark Twain Lake. Here, visitors can relax on the Salt River and imagine what life was like when the beloved author explored the same waters and created legendary characters like Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn. Keep reading
Recreation
Visitors enjoy fishing for bass below the Re-Regulation Dam. Bird watching for waterfowl and boating are also popular activities.
Facilities
The recreation area is for day-use visitors only, and provides a boat ramp, playground and picnic shelters.
Natural Features
Bluffview lies about 10 miles downstream of Mark Twain Lake and the Clarence Cannon Dam. Here on the Salt River, a smaller dam is in place to form a storage pool for wetland purposes. Mark Twain Lake and the Salt River are hugged by tree-topped hills in north-central Missouri.
Nearby Attractions
Tour Mark Twain's birthplace in Florida, Missouri, or try the David C. Berti Shooting Range. Visit the town of Hannibal to see the Mark Twain Boyhood Home and Museum.
What the agency tells you
Don't Move Firewood: Protect your forests from tree-killing pests by buying your firewood locally and burning it on-site. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.
Facilities
- Boat ramp
- Yes
- Playground
- Yes
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Something open on 28 of the next 28 bookable nightsread 16:15 UTC
The agency files 1 record here and marks it day use, not overnight. On its own record there’s nothing here to spend the night in.
OpenBookedNot reservable
Watch for a cancellation
Full? Watch it.
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We read recreation.gov once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time a site in your window is free for the nights you asked for.
Scanners that check every few minutes exist, and most of them charge. This one is free, it reads the same calendar, and it won’t always be first.
We make nothing when you book. The link goes straight to the government.
Every line of the receipt · 12
What you actually pay
Who keeps the booking fee
The agency’s own policy text says the reservation fee and the cancellation processing fee are “retained by the reservation service contractor”, and that a campground concessionaire will decline to refund them because “they did not receive these fees”. Recreation.gov is run under contract by Booz Allen Hamilton. What share of your booking fee the contractor keeps isn’t published in any federal dataset we can read, so we print no number for it. Our reporting on the contract →
How we know this receipt · 5
recreation.gov availability, read 16:15 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
1 records · the site map
All 1 records
| BLUF | GS1 | day use | 15 amp | yes | 385 ft | $30 |
The agency files 1 more record here that isn’t a site for the night. It files it as day use. It’s in the table above, marked for what it is, and it isn’t counted as a site.
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Frank Russell4.8 mi
John Spalding Rec Ar4.8 mi
John C. Briscoe Group Use5.4 mi
Ray Behrens6.2 mi
Indian Creek (MO)8.9 mi
Dry Fork Recreation AreaMark Twain National Forest · 62 miFrom Hannibal, MO, travel west on Hwy 36 for 17 miles, turn south on Route J, continue traveling south for 4 miles, turn east on Route A, travel for 6 miles. From Center, MO, travel north on Hwy HH for 4.8 miles, turn west on Route A for 1.9 miles. From Monroe City, MO. travel east on Hwy 36, turn south on Rt. J for 4 miles, turn east on Rt. A for 6 miles.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Center, MO
Typical weather
Typical October night 45°F, day 66°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 18°F, below freezing. Bring a bag rated colder than that, and expect ice in the water bottle.
Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or more
A normal is the 1991-2020 average for the month, not a forecast: about half of all Julys are colder than the July line. The seven-day forecast above answers the other question.
The land, and who answers for it
who answers for it · a letter you can send
Who answers for this land
Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake) is in Missouri’s 6th congressional district. Its representative, Sam Graves (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →
Who can change it · 3
The agency’s own record files sites here and marks every one of them day use. The draft asks whether any could open to overnight camping, and if not, why.
- The member who votes the moneySam GravesU.S. Representative · Missouri’s 6th district
- Your senator, on the same appropriationEric SchmittU.S. Senator · Missouri
- Your senator, on the same appropriationJosh HawleyU.S. Senator · Missouri
Read the draft, or change the wording
Asks them to put the same question to the agency in writing.
Subject Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake) has sites, and nobody may sleep in them
Dear Sam Graves, I’m a constituent in Missouri’s 6th district. Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake), Missouri carries 1 record on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’s own file, every one of them marked day use rather than overnight. I’m asking you to put one question to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in writing: would they consider opening any of these sites to overnight camping, and if not, why not? Road trips and camping on public land are part of how this country knows itself. It’s where a lot of people meet the place they live in for the first time, and it has never been something you had to be well off, or well organised six months in advance, to do. Sent about Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake) (Missouri) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the same question to the agency in writing.
Subject Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake) has sites, and nobody may sleep in them
Dear Eric Schmitt, I’m a constituent in Missouri. Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake), Missouri carries 1 record on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’s own file, every one of them marked day use rather than overnight. I’m asking you to put one question to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in writing: would they consider opening any of these sites to overnight camping, and if not, why not? Road trips and camping on public land are part of how this country knows itself. It’s where a lot of people meet the place they live in for the first time, and it has never been something you had to be well off, or well organised six months in advance, to do. Sent about Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake) (Missouri) via campanac.com
Asks them to put the same question to the agency in writing.
Subject Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake) has sites, and nobody may sleep in them
Dear Josh Hawley, I’m a constituent in Missouri. Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake), Missouri carries 1 record on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’s own file, every one of them marked day use rather than overnight. I’m asking you to put one question to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in writing: would they consider opening any of these sites to overnight camping, and if not, why not? Road trips and camping on public land are part of how this country knows itself. It’s where a lot of people meet the place they live in for the first time, and it has never been something you had to be well off, or well organised six months in advance, to do. Sent about Bluffview (Mark Twain Lake) (Missouri) via campanac.com