Lake Michigan and Lake Macatawa almost touch at Holland State Park, a channel and a dune line apart, and the beach week is that strip of sugar sand. Walk the channel wall at dusk and Big Red, the lighthouse outside the park, is lit across the water on the far pier.
Several days fit on that beach without a touring loop. Swim in Lake Michigan and sleep in the park.
Lake Michigan Beach Campground has 98 sites, mostly 30-amp electric, and 31 of them are 50-amp full hookup with water and sewer. Every site on that loop is paved, and camping equipment has to stay on the pavement. Lake Macatawa Campground is the grass-and-gravel loop, 211 sites on 30- or 50-amp electric.
Book the site before the van. You can reserve a Michigan DNR campsite six months ahead of arrival, with new inventory at 8 a.m. on weekdays and 9 a.m. on weekends, as of September 2026. Summer weekend sites at Holland State Park usually disappear at that six-month mark.
If you need more sleeping space than a van holds, Holland also has RVs for rent.
Tulip Time in Holland
Early May, Holland goes citywide for Tulip Time, ten days built around more than six million tulips. The city runs on that calendar for those ten days, and Holland State Park is still the overnight.
Windmill Island Gardens is the Dutch stop that belongs on that same weekend. The De Zwaan is a working 1761 mill that still turns and grinds flour, a quarter-mile walk from the entrance, open mid-April through October, with the tulip beds at their best late April into early May.
Saugatuck Dunes and Saugatuck
South of Holland you climb the dunes at Saugatuck Dunes State Park and come back the same day. The Beach Trail is the short walk, three-quarters of a mile one way with yellow markers, a forested approach that drops you onto open Lake Michigan. Four trails reach the water across 2.5 miles of shore, and 13 miles of trail is enough to make a day of it. After the dune, Saugatuck town is the stop before you come back to Holland State Park for the night.
Grand Haven is the next beach town, and that overnight is on the Grand Rapids campervan page. For the rest of Michigan, start from campervan rentals in Michigan.