Lake Ottawa Campground
3Heads up3 fires, nearest 37 mi
- Right now
- Nobody has saidNo season, no closure, no bookings to read
- A night
- $22From, per site
- Sites
- 3231 on recreation.gov
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 8 notices
In the agency’s own words
Planning a trip to the Lake Ottawa Campground? Watch for Alerts at the top of the page for any Alerts regarding this facility. Lake Ottawa Campground is in a beautiful forested northwoods setting located 5 miles southwest of Iron River, MI, on the Iron River Ranger District. Keep reading
Recreation
Located adjacent to the Campground is Lake Ottawa, a deep cold water lake that provides fishermen with a good variety of game fish. There is a boat ramp with ample parking for trailers. Ge-Che Trail - Length is approximately 9 miles on a dirt trail. This trail provides scenery of primarily hardwood forest. The trail can be accessed from Lake Ottawa boat landing, and from within the campground. Lake Ottawa Recreation Area day use area provides indoor facilities for a group picnic, and a large outdoor picnic area complete with picnic tables and grills. The area is large enough to provide plenty of space for all. Also located in the same area is an athletic field. The day use building provides indoor seating for eating or parties. The building has a fireplace, electricity, and flush toilets.
Facilities
Lake Ottawa Campground is 95% surrounded by National Forest System Land and offers 32 campsites, a picnic shelter with two stone fireplaces and original log picnic tables, and two log toilet buildings with flush toilets. A pressurized water system and RV dump station are located in the campground. Adjacent to the campground, in the day use area, is a CCC era recreation building, with flush toilets, swimming beach, playing field, picnic areas and boat launch.
Nearby Attractions
Stateline-Mile Post Zero Trail - Scenery is hardwood, forested with two destination points on the Brule River. The trail is not a loop, it is a relatively flat dirt trail. The length of the trial is approximately 4/10 of a mile and takes you to the historic Stateline Mile Post Zero location indicating the border between Michgian and Wisconsin. The combination of topography and thousands of miles of rivers and streams have created hundreds of waterfalls throughout the Upper Peninsula, with several of the waterfalls located on the Ottawa. The Ottawa National Forest has 18 named waterfalls, 53,637 acres of lakes, 2,366 miles of perennial streams, 2,890 miles of intermittent (occasional) streams, and 210,761 acres of wetlands. The falls vary in size and some are easier to get to than others. For more information on the most visited waterfalls on and around the Ottawa National Forest, visit the Ottawa National Forest website waterfall page . Contact Info For facility specific information, please call (906) 661-8870.
What the agency tells you
Camping in a developed recreation site is allowed for a period not longer than 14 days. After this time, you must move to another campground or dispersed site for at least 24 hours.
Campers must occupy the site the first night.
Eight people and two motorized vehicles are allowed per campsite with a maximum of one RV or camper trailer and two tents per camping site or three tents per camping site.
Everything else this campground posts · 5
Don't Move Firewood: Prevent the spread of tree-killing pests by obtaining firewood near your destination and burning it on-site. For more information visit dontmovefirewood.org.
Lake Ottawa Campground Map
This campground is open to OHV’s. OHV’s must stay on the roadway or camping spur.
This campground is operated by Camp Host, LLC under a special use permit with the Ottawa National Forest.
Lake Ottawa Pavillion will be closed for the 2026 season due to rehabilitation work needed to the interior and exterior of the building. We are sorry for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience
Tents and rigs
- Sites
- 32
- Hookups
- None
- Paved pads
- All
- Accessible sites
- None listed
- Pets
- Allowed
- Campfires
- Allowed, barring fire bans
- Shade
- Every site
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- “…has a fireplace, electricity, and flush toilets. Facilities Lake Ottawa Campground is 95%…”
- Dump station
- Yes
- recreation.gov lists “Dump Station”
- Boat ramp
- Yes
- Camp host
- On site
- recreation.gov lists “Host”
Around the campground
- On the water
- Waterfall, Lake, River, Creek, Beach
- Biking
- Boating
- Canoeing
- Fishing
- Hiking
- Kayaking
- Mountain biking
- Swimming
No reading yet, book on recreation.gov
recreation.gov lists 31 of the 32 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 · 18
What you actually pay
Derived by CAMPANAC: the agency’s published rate for this season, $22 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 Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
32 sites · which ones have room · the site map
The sites, ranked
from 31 mapped sitesAll 32 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. 32 of the 32 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.
| Loop 1 | 01 | standard nonelectric | 244 ft | 643 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 02 | standard nonelectric | 230 ft | 589 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 03 | standard nonelectric | 95 ft | 358 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 04 | standard nonelectric | 95 ft | 273 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 05 | standard nonelectric | 95 ft | 367 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 06 | standard nonelectric | 161 ft | 201 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 07 | standard nonelectric | 95 ft | 356 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 08 | standard nonelectric | 102 ft | 401 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 09 | standard nonelectric | 102 ft | 387 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 10 | standard nonelectric | 97 ft | 279 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 11 | standard nonelectric | 97 ft | 249 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 12 | standard nonelectric | 161 ft | 219 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 13 | standard nonelectric | 54 ft | 173 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 14 | standard nonelectric | 54 ft | 148 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 15 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | 140 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 16 | standard nonelectric | 52 ft | 182 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 17 | standard nonelectric | 122 ft | 329 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 18 | standard nonelectric | 99 ft | 217 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 19 | standard nonelectric | 72 ft | 233 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 20 | standard nonelectric | 94 ft | 316 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 21 | standard nonelectric | 72 ft | 216 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 22 | standard nonelectric | 82 ft | 193 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 23 | standard nonelectric | 94 ft | 293 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 24 | standard nonelectric | 131 ft | 332 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 25 | standard nonelectric | 131 ft | 440 ft | $22 |
| Loop 1 | 26 | standard nonelectric | 96 ft | 287 ft | $22 |
| Loop 2 | 27 | type not stated | 190 ft | $22 | |
| Loop 2 | 28 | standard nonelectric | 163 ft | 144 ft | $22 |
| Loop 2 | 29 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 305 ft | $22 |
| Loop 2 | 30 | standard nonelectric | 60 ft | 327 ft | $22 |
| Loop 2 | 31 | standard nonelectric | 94 ft | 375 ft | $22 |
| Loop 2 | 32 | standard nonelectric | 94 ft | 375 ft | $22 |
OpenStreetMap has no toilet mapped within 1 km of this campground, so no site here carries a toilet distance. That’s a gap in the map, not a finding about the campground.
25 of 32 listed
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Golden Lake CampgroundOttawa National Forest · 8.7 miStevens Lake CampgroundNicolet National Forest · 11 miStevens Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 11 mi
Kentuck Lake CampgroundNicolet National Forest · 12 miKentuck Lake Recreation AreaNicolet National Forest · 12 mi
Spectacle Lake Campground (Wisconsin)Nicolet National Forest · 13 mi- From Iron River, Mi., travel west on US 2, turn south on M 73, travel approximately 3/4 mile, turn west on Lake Ottawa Road and travel approximately 4 miles to the campground.
- From Watersmeet, Mi., travel 28 miles east on US 2, turn south on M 73, travel approximately 3/4 mile, turn west on Lake Ottawa Road and travel approximately 4 miles to the campground.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Iron River, MI
Typical weather
Typical October night 31°F, day 53°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical February night 0°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
what threatens it · who answers for it
What threatens this place
You’re camping on ground somebody wants. We track the threats and the comment deadlines.
Who answers for this land
Lake Ottawa Campground is in Michigan’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Jack Bergman (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →