County Line Campground in South Dakota
Camp South Dakota: I’m talking with Dale today. He’s going to tell us about County Line Campground in South Dakota. Dale, why don’t you get us started with giving us a little bit of background on County Line Campground?
Dale: The County Line Campground – I purchased that in 2009. We started building – putting up a new main building – in the fall of 2009. We finished everything up, or not everything, in 2010. And I kind of felt like we were full to be open then. And we’ve got big pull-through sites. It’s located in a small town in South Dakota, and we’re in the heart of the hunting and fishing areas.
Camp South Dakota: Perfect. It looks like a nice, open space there where you can kind of spread out.
Dale: Yeah, they’re all big pull-through sites we’ve got.
Camp South Dakota: Okay. And so, you have the RV camping. Do you have any other kinds of camping there?
Dale: We’ve got tent camping. We’ve got boon docking, they call it, where people just bring their campers and we put them in a big lot we own there, and they just take care of themselves. No water. No sewer hook-ups here.
Camp South Dakota: Okay.
Dale:And we do have a dry cabin. A cabin that we rent out.
Camp South Dakota: All right. And what are the most popular activities for guests at the campground there?
Dale: Oh, a lot of them come and see. There’s a lot of Native American history in that area that has never been uncovered or detailed. And a lot of small towns. They go around through. Take in the activities around South Dakota. There’s a lot of, they call them, ranch and rodeos that they have.
Camp South Dakota: Yeah, absolutely. And you said that it’s prime hunting area around there, and so I imagine that a lot of your guests are hunters. What types of hunting is it?
Dale: (Unclear 2:02.7) and ducks and geese.
Camp South Dakota: All right, great.
Dale: And then they have a lot of deer hunting. Bull hunting. (Unclear 2:12.5) hunting going on there.
Camp South Dakota: Okay, and how far do people have to travel from the campground to do the hunting that they want to do?
Dale:Right out of town. A couple miles.
Camp South Dakota: Perfect.
Dale: Yeah.
Camp South Dakota: So that’s nice.
Dale: We get a lot of sports fish men coming through now. They fish in like the walleyed tournaments in North Dakota, Montana, and all around. We get them a lot out of Missouri, Nebraska, the cities and such.
Camp South Dakota: Perfect. So you get to sort of function as deer camp for some guys for part of the year.
Dale: Right.
Camp South Dakota: All right, perfect. Two more questions for you. If you were going to spend just one hour hanging out in the Park, how would you spend your time there?
Dale: How would I spend my time? Probably enjoying the small town life.
Camp South Dakota: Nice.
Dale: Very laid back. Yeah.
Camp South Dakota: And how close are you guys to the town?
Dale: We are located right in the town.
Camp South Dakota: Oh, nice. So, if someone was staying, I’d be able to just walk from the campground right into downtown and kind of check out the shops and stuff.
Dale: Yeah, it’s a very small town. I mean it’s a very small country town. There’s only probably about 250 to 300 people that live there.
Camp South Dakota: That’s exactly the size of the town that I grew up in, Dale, so pretty used to kind of what would be around there. Got a couple gas stations probably. Maybe one bar, a bunch of churches, and not a whole lot else.
Dale: That’s about it. We’ve got a bank and I guess the repair shop, and that’s about it.
Camp South Dakota: Yeah.
Dale: We get a lot of comments on people, especially the people that come from California, about how quiet it is. We’re a mile off the Interstate, so we don’t get any traffic noise.
Camp South Dakota: Well, and what’s also nice about that, which I’m sure if anyone who comes from a larger town who stays there, because that town is so small, you probably have a pretty decent view of the stars at night out there.
Dale: Yeah, we get a lot of comments on that. A lot of comments.
Camp South Dakota: Yeah, absolutely.
Dale: A lot of people now that have been coming back. We cater a lot to – I call them the sobereds – people that travel full-time.
Camp South Dakota: Sure.
Dale: And we’re getting a lot of them that are coming back. And some of them will spend a week, ten days. Some of them are up to a months’ out.
Camp South Dakota: Perfect. Well, hey Dale, thanks for giving us some more information about the area. It sounds like a nice, quant little town, and also a really nice getaway for outdoorsmen, fishing, for hunting a little bit of small game, and also for deer hunting, and thanks for giving us some more information about County Line Campground in South Dakota.
Dale: Okay, thank you very much.
