In summer the beach at Lewis and Clark Recreation Area fills with towels and coolers, and the marina faces the still pool Gavins Point Dam made of the Missouri. The lodge looks over that same South Dakota shore, so you swim by day and sleep in the campground behind the sand. West of Yankton on Highway 52, that campground is the Yankton Section of Lewis and Clark Recreation Area.
South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks keeps electrical and non-electrical sites plus camping cabins at the recreation area. In summer the electrical pads are the ones that go first, and a tent-only site is a different night from a hooked-up van. Most sites book online in advance, as of September 2026, and a portion are same-day reservation only, so the pad is the first booking and the van is the second. If you need more bunks than a campervan sleeps, look at RV rentals in Yankton.
The campgrounds stay reachable through winter, though showers and flush toilets may close from early October through late April and vault toilets stay open. Below the dam the Missouri runs as a river again, and that is the other half of the week.
Missouri National Recreational River
Below Gavins Point Dam the Missouri goes back to a wide, sandbar-braided river, with cottonwood banks on the South Dakota side and pale chalky bluffs across the water in Nebraska. You see those bluffs from a South Dakota river access, paddle that stretch, and sleep at Lewis and Clark.
From Riverside Park in Yankton you can float downriver toward St. Helena, Nebraska. Cottonwoods line the South Dakota banks, and sandbars braid in and out of the channel as you go. Primitive camping is allowed on South Dakota sandbars only. Nebraska sandbars and both riverbanks are private property, and wind is the hazard the park names.
Myron Grove River Access on Highway 50 between Yankton and Vermillion is a canoe and kayak launch, and Vermillion is the next South Dakota town, with Spirit Mound Historic Prairie south of it. Springfield is another river town on the South Dakota shore, and Niobrara is the Nebraska town across the water.
The Meridian Bridge is the walk from Yankton into Nebraska, with the river under the deck and the Yankton Forest Tract trails on the far side. If the trip keeps going east, Omaha is the handoff.
Chief White Crane Recreation Area
Bald eagles winter in the cottonwoods along the Missouri at Chief White Crane Recreation Area, close to the water. In the warm months this is the overnight for people who want that riverbank, and you can sleep under the same trees. South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks keeps electrical and tent-only sites plus camping cabins, and as of September 2026 it closes the riverbank to vehicles from mid-November through late March for those eagles. Lewis and Clark is the overnight you can still drive into when that road is shut.
If you turn north of the river, Sioux Falls is the next South Dakota city with its own overnight.