Cottonwood Campground (IA)
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $14From, per site
- Sites
- 1511 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 15 notices
In the agency’s own words
COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND IS CLOSED FOR THE 2026 RECREATION SEASON The Cottonwood Campground is located within the Dam Complex at the Coralville Lake Project. The Coralville Lake Project is a multiple use project providing primary benefits in flood control and low flow augmentation, and secondary benefits in recreation, fish and wildlife management and forest management. Coralville Lake provides many recreational opportunities, including boating, camping, hiking, mountain biking, lake and river fishing, swimming, water skiing, picnicking and hunting. Keep reading
Recreation
Visitors enjoy Coralville Lake for camping, boating, fishing, swimming and water activities. Anglers will find large and smallmouth bass, crappie, walleye and catfish. Several trails are within the Dam Complex, including Squire Point, Woodpecker Trail, Tailwater Riverwalk and barrier-free Veterans Trail. The Devonian Fossil Gorge is just below the dam, offering a unique opportunity to explore a 375-million-year old sea floor and discover fossil remains of sea life that once inhabited this tropical marine environment. Twenty discovery points can be found throughout the site along with a cell phone audio tour. The Turkey Creek Disc Golf Course is located in the Dam Complex and offers nine partially wooden and open holes.
Facilities
The Cottonwood Campground offers 11 non-electric walk-to tent campsites. Amenities include a modern restroom and shower facility located at the main parking lot. The campground fee booth is located in the West Overlook Campground. The dump station, drinking water, trash and recycling receptacles are located just outside of the West Overlook Campground.
Natural Features
Coralville Lake is located in the Iowa River Valley, just north of Iowa City. The Cottonwood Campground lies among a heavily wooded forest of mixed hardwood species on the west side of the dam. Wildlife is abundant throughout the project. Whitetail deer, turkeys, pheasants, waterfowl, song birds and other species roam the lands around the lake.
Nearby Attractions
Iowa City/Coralville offers the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, University of Iowa campus, hospital and clinics, numerous restaurants and shops as well as Coral Ridge Mall. Cedar Rapids has wonderful cultural, historic and ethnic attractions such as The National Czech and Slovak Museum and Library and is the home of the Kernels Professional Baseball Club. West Branch boasts the Herbert Hoover National Historic Site and Presidential Library/Museum. At Amana Colonies visit seven quaint villages with outstanding restaurants, wineries, historic sites and specialty shops. Kalona is known as the "Quilt Capital of Iowa" and is home to an Old Order Amish and Mennonite Community.
What the agency tells you
Three tents are permitted per site.
Up to 6 occupants are permitted per site.
Quiet Hours are from 10:00 p.m. - 6:00 a.m.
Everything else this campground posts · 12
Visitors shall register for their campsite at the West Overlook Campground Fee Booth prior to setting up on the campsite.
Check-Out Time: 12:00 P.M.
Check-In Time: 2:00 P.M.
Do not attach anything to trees.
Pets must be penned, on a leash under 6 feet in length, or otherwise physically restrained.
No parking on grass, roads, shoulders or empty campsites.
No UTVs or golf carts within the campground.
All of the following items are prohibited: bouncy houses, swimming pools, chinese lanterns, loaded firearms, explosives, ammunition, bow or other projectile-firing devices, and fireworks.
No-Shows: If a customer does not arrive and register for their campsite by check-out time the day after original arrival date, the customer will be assessed a $20.00 service fee and forfeit the first night use fee.
Cancellation: If a customer cancels a reservation they will be charged a $10.00 service fee. If a customer cancels a reservation the day before or on the day of arrival they will be charged a $10.00 service fee and will also forfeit the first night's use fee (not to exceed the total paid for the original reservation).
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.
The dump station, drinking water, trash and recycling receptacles are located just outside of the West Overlook Campground.
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 15 · 11 walk-in
- Hookups
- None
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Yes, the record doesn't say what kind
- “Amenities include a modern restroom and shower facility located at the main parking lot.”
- Showers
- Yes, the record doesn’t say what kind
- “Amenities include a modern restroom and shower facility located at the main parking lot.”
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…Overlook Campground. The dump station, drinking water, trash and recycling receptacles are located just…”
- Dump station
- Yes
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River, Creek
- Hiking
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 11 of the 15 campsites the agency files here. The rest aren’t on its booking system, so a reservation won’t get you one.
No availability snapshot inside the last 36 hours, so this page draws nothing rather than ageing a reading into fiction.
Watch for a cancellation
Full? Watch it.
One email when a night opens, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
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.
Tell me when the season opens
Watch for the season to open
One email when the season goes on sale, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We check once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time the agency has that season on sale.
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
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $14 a night, plus one $8 recreation.gov reservation fee for the booking. A weekend here means Friday and Saturday night, booked once. Optional charges (an extra vehicle, a second tent, a dump-station fee) are listed separately and aren’t in this total.
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
rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Sep 10, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
15 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 11 mapped sitesAll 15 sites
The price is derived by CAMPANAC, not published per site: the per-night rate this campground publishes for each site’s own site type. 11 of the 15 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C01 | walk to | 64 ft | 923 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C02 | walk to | 61 ft | 848 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C03 | walk to | 59 ft | 863 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C04 | walk to | 55 ft | 810 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C05 | walk to | 55 ft | 802 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C06 | walk to | 60 ft | 815 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C07 | walk to | 95 ft | 913 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C08 | walk to | 70 ft | 972 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C09 | walk to | 61 ft | 922 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C10 | walk to | 65 ft | 988 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C11 | walk to | 70 ft | 1,021 ft | $14 |
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C12 | type not stated | 1,172 ft | ||
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C13 | type not stated | 1,261 ft | ||
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C14 | type not stated | 1,350 ft | ||
| COTTONWOOD CAMPGROUND (IA) | C15 | type not stated | 1,462 ft |
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Tailwater West Campground0.1 mi
West Overlook Campground0.2 mi
Linder Point Campground0.5 mi
Tailwater East Campground0.5 mi
Sugar Bottom Campground2.6 mi
Sandy Beach Camp7.0 miFrom Interstate 80 (Iowa City, Iowa), take Exit 244 towards Dubuque St./North Liberty. Travel north on Dubuque St. for 3 miles and turn right onto West Overlook Rd. NE. Travel on West Overlook Rd. NE for 1.1 miles. At the second stop sign, turn right onto Prairie Du Chien Rd. NE. Travel east on Prairie Du Chien Rd. NE for 0.1 miles. The entrance to the Cottonwood Campground will be located on the right side of the road.
From Interstate 380 (North Liberty, Iowa), take Exit 4 towards North Liberty. Travel east on W. Penn St. for 2 miles and turn right onto N. Dubuque St. Travel south on N. Dubuque St. for 1.9 miles, at the traffic circle, continue straight onto Dubuque St. NE. Continue traveling south on Dubuque St. NE for 1.9 miles. Turn left onto West Overlook Rd. NE. Travel on West Overlook Rd. NE for 1.1 miles. At the second stop sign, turn right onto Prairie Du Chien Rd. NE. Travel east on Prairie Du Chien Rd. NE for 0.1 miles. The entrance to the Cottonwood Campground will be located on the right side of the road.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Coralville, IA
Typical weather
Typical October night 42°F, day 64°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 15°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
Who answers for this land
Cottonwood Campground (IA) is in Iowa’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →