Two new “camping cabins” are now completed and available for rent for Raccoon River Valley Trail users, at beautiful Sportsman Park on the east edge of Dawson, on the RRVT’s “North Loop.” You can see the cabins here and get the details. With both heat and air-conditioning, they are available year ’round.
DAWSON, Iowa, February 1, 2011 – Another important amenity is now ready for the public along the Raccoon River Valley Trail in west central Iowa. Two new “camping cabins” are now rentable in Sportsman Park just east of the town of Dawson. This park is about one city block north of the new North Loop of the RRVT.
“These cabins will be great for RRVT users who will be passing by on the trail,” said Mike Wallace, the Dallas County conservation director.
The two new cabins, as they were being completed last fall at Sportsman Park, near Dawson, about one block north of the RRVT. (Photos from Dallas County Conservation)
The conservation board manages Sportsman Park and has an employee living there full-time, so the cabins are available for campers all year long. It’s the Dallas County conservation staff that has constructed the cabins, too.
Wallace said the cabins are each 14 feet by 18 feet and can sleep five. There are two sets of bunk beds in each cabin, and a larger bed that can sleep two. Each cabin also has a bathroom, shower and sink. Each also has a microwave oven and a small refrigerator. And the cabins have both heat and air-conditioning.
“They are small and cozy,” Wallace said. “It’ll be like camping without having to have a tent or bringing along a trailer.”
A closer view of one of the cabins.
The cabins are of wood-frame construction, but they also have log siding on them, so they will look neat in the wooded setting of Sportsman Park. That park also has a tenting area, and it is expected to become one of the most popular campgrounds all along the trail. The RRVT currently stretches 56 miles from Jefferson on the north to Waukee on the southeast, but the new North Loop, which is being completed in the next couple years, will add 33 miles and bring the trail’s total to 89. Sportsman Park is located a half-mile east of the Dawson trailhead, and about six miles west of Perry.
Additional photos, of the completed cabins, and information about renting them is available by clicking here. Or you can phone the Dallas County Conservation Board in Perry at (515) 465-3577.
