U.S. Forest Service · Nicolet National Forest · WI
Kentuck Lake Recreation Area
5Heads up5 fires, nearest 27 mi
Wildfire
Schneider fire · 27 mi away · 0 acres · updated Oct 14, 2026
Wildfire
Loon fire · 41 mi away · 0 acres · updated Oct 14, 2026
Wildfire
Aspen Power fire · 42 mi away · 0 acres · updated Oct 14, 2026
Wildfire
Blackberry fire · 45 mi away · 3 acres · updated Oct 16, 2026
Wildfire
Bog fire · 49 mi away · 94 acres · updated Oct 7, 2026
Fires: NIFC/IRWIN via MTJP wildfire tracker · Oct 16, 2026
The agency doesn’t say how you get a siteIts record carries no access type, so treat it as a place to phone before you drive.
- Right now
- OpenThe agency lists it open
- Season
- May 2 – November 30Open May 2 through November 30
1,740 ftElevation
383 ftWater · Kentuck Lake
12.9 miNE of Eagle River, WI
74%Tree cover
Bortle 2Night sky · 22nd darkest of 70 in WI
Open May 2 through November 30Today
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there
In the agency’s own words
If you are looking for a base camp to explore area trails or enjoy a variety of water activities with the family, try Kentuck Lake Recreation Area off Highway 70 east of Eagle River. The Kentuck Lake Recreation Area on the Eagle River-Florence Ranger District consists of a convenient campground with 31 campsites equipped with fire rings, grills and picnic tables. The area features some accessible sites/facilities and paved roadways. There is also a pressurized water system available for drinking water. Day use facilities include a 955-acre lake, paved boat launch, year-round fishing and access to many area trails. Keep reading
Enjoy a scenic 2.5 mile (5 mile round trip) hiking trail connecting Kentuck to Spectacle Lake campgrounds. In the spring, get up early and go birding or try your hand at identifying wildflowers along the trail. Boat, fish, hike, picnic or enjoy viewing scenery and wildlife, then the Kentuck Lake Recreation Area is the place for you, conveniently located 15 minutes east of Eagle River. Kentuck Lake recreation area is dog friendly; see our restrictions below for more information.
Source: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
Facilities
- Drinking water
- Yes
- “…a pressurized water system available for drinking water. Day use facilities include a 955-acre lake, paved…”
- Boat ramp
- Yes
Source: Stated in the agency description
Water, toilets and showers: read from the agency description, shown above · Sep 12, 2026
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River
Source: Stated in the agency description
Phone before you drive
recreation.gov publishes no availability for a campground you can’t reserve, so there’s no thirty-night reading to draw here. The season bar above is what the agency does publish.
Booking window6 months outBooking opens 6 months ahead; today unlocks arrivals through April 16, 2027. The agency publishes no reservable season in the record we hold, so the window may close earlier than that.recreation.gov
Runs itU.S. Forest Servicethe agency’s record
Every line of the receipt · 9
What you actually pay
The sign priceU.S. Forest Service
The U.S. Forest Service publishes no per-night rate for this campground that we can read, so there’s no sign price to print. That’s a gap in the record, not a free campground.
Individual campsite fee is $18, or $9 with the use of an Interagency pass (access or senior) for lakeside sites and $15, or $7.50 for non-lakeside sites.
The interagency pass applies only to the fee for the campsite physically occupied by the pass holder, not to any additional fees or campsite(s) occupied by members of the pass holder's party.
There is a $5 recreation use fee for the boat landing.
The Forest also has an annual pass available for $30.
To learn more visit https://www.fs.usda.gov/main/cnnf/passes-permits/recreation .
This does not apply to registered campers.
The booking feerecreation.gov
We hold no recreation.gov booking record for this campground, so we can’t say whether a booking fee applies.
What a stay costs
The agency publishes no nightly rate for this campground, so there’s no total to show.
How we know this receipt · 4
Booking fee, change fee, cancellation fee, no-show: Rules and Reservation Policies, Recreation.gov, the published fee schedule, curated by hand into lib/reservation-fee-schedule.json (9 rows, each carrying its own verbatim sentence). The publisher states these policies were last updated September 2019. · Sep 9, 2026
The two totals: Derived by CAMPANAC by adding the agency’s own published nightly rate to recreation.gov’s own published reservation fee. Both components are cited above; the addition is ours and is shown only where every component is known. · Sep 9, 2026
Who keeps the booking fee: Recreation.gov facility policy text, Dead Swede Campground (facility 234221) · Not on the national policy page. This is agency policy text recreation.gov publishes on individual campground pages; this site holds it verbatim on 45 active campgrounds (campground_rules.cancellation_description, scripts/load-facility-rules.mjs). · Sep 9, 2026
The contract: Reservation Gods: Who Stole Our Campsites and Sold Them Back to Us, More Than Just Parks, April 2025 · Apr 1, 2025
Source: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
record Aug 24, 2026 · How we know all this
Getting there
the map and the coordinate
Where it is
Also near here
Kentuck Lake CampgroundNicolet National Forest · 0.2 miSpectacle Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 1.8 mi
Spectacle Lake Campground (Wisconsin)Nicolet National Forest · 2.0 miFranklin Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 3.8 mi
Franklin Lake4.9 miAnvil Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 5.4 mi
Kentuck Lake CampgroundNicolet National Forest · 0.2 miSpectacle Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 1.8 miSpectacle Lake Campground (Wisconsin)Nicolet National Forest · 2.0 miFranklin Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 3.8 miFranklin Lake4.9 miAnvil Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 5.4 miSource: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
Overnight23°Clear
Saturday54°Sunny
Saturday Night35°Clear
Sunday59°Sunny
NWS forecast for Eagle River, WI
Source: National Weather Service, GRB forecast office · Oct 17, 2026
Typical weather
Typical October night 33°F, day 53°F.
Coldest night of the open season: typical November night 21°F, below freezing. Bring a bag rated colder than that, and expect ice in the water bottle.
90°32°-10°
Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or moreOutside the published season
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.
Measured at: EAGLE RVR, WI (USC00472314), 14 miles away and 117 ft lower
The land, and who answers for it
what threatens it · who answers for it
What threatens this place
developing
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Source: MTJP Threatened Lands map · Sep 28, 2026
Who answers for this land
Kentuck Lake Recreation Area is in Wisconsin’s 7th congressional district. Its representative, Tom Tiffany (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →
How we know
every fact on this page, and where it came from
Right now: The agency lists it open right now.
Season: USFS Enterprise Data Warehouse · Aug 24, 2026
Elevation: USGS 3DEP elevation point query at this campground’s coordinate · Sep 7, 2026
Tree cover: NLCD Tree Canopy Cover 2024 (USDA Forest Service / MRLC), one 30 m cell at this coordinate · Sep 9, 2026
Cell signal: the Forest Service’s own campground description, read as text by CAMPANAC. None of this is a measurement. It’s what the land manager published about the place, and phones, carriers and weather all disagree with each other; treat it as a warning, not a promise.