A full-service campground at Cabela's?!
We left South Dakota and had just a couple of days before we were due in Colorado for a mountain of repairs (see what I did there?), so we figured we would take a drive through Nebraska and check off a new state. Now, western Nebraska isn't as desolate as you might think. There are grasslands with random insane rocks that jut out as if from nowhere. You may recall Chimney Rock from your childhood days of playing Oregon Trail. And let's not forget a roadtripper's must-stop when passing through Alliance, NE: Carhenge! A family endeavor to commemorate their patriarch, this is a sculpture designed to look like Stonehenge, except it's made of cars. It's exactly the type of roadside stop you'd expect it to be.
As for choosing where to stay in Nebraska, we had 2 nights to hang our hats and decided to get as close to the NE-CO border as possible. The nearest town with good RV parking options was Sidney. When looking up places to stay, I found a Cabela's Campground, and I was immediately curious. Cabela's is a popular outdoor outfitter that's known to allow overnight parking for trucks and RVs. They typically have a giant lot with a dump station, and RVers see this as an alternative to staying overnight in a Walmart, or as we typically do, a Cracker Barrel. We call it lot-docking in the RV community. But this Cabela's was different; it was an actual full-service RV park. You could choose full hookups or electric only, and while most sites were pull-thru, there were a few back-in options as well. The sites were gravel, and reviewers raved about the grassy spaces between the full hookup sites.
I had so many questions. First off, why? Well, Sidney NE is where the Cabela's headquarters is located. The campground sits between the headquarters and the store. We still aren't exactly sure how it came about, but we believe it's only a few years old from the looks of it and the reviews we've seen.
The next question was, what's the game plan? We've noticed other "lot-docking" companies catering to RVers more. For example, some Loves Truck Stop locations have started putting in RV parks so RVers don't need to sleep with the trucks. We haven't been to one yet, but the general consensus seems to be that they're missing the mark a little bit. Evidently they're building them out to be real campgrounds with amenities like pickleball and splash pads, but they're charging an arm and a leg for them. Let's face it, no family is going to be planning their weekend camping trip and exclaiming, "Let's all go to Loves!" Why not keep the prices reasonable, forget the amenities, and just give the RVers what we need: A convenient place for an overnight where we can hook up if we want, dump, have some facilities like a bathroom or even laundry, but then we continue on our way?
At first, I wondered if I'd feel this way about the Cabela's campground. To whom are they catering? Weary travelers popping by for a quick overnight? Shoppers wanting to test out their new camping equipment? Or are people actually utilizing this place as a destination? We decided to spend our 2 nights there and see what we could figure out.
The sites are first-come, first-served. When you pull in, there's a box where you pick up a registration form. Then you go find your site, fill out the form, and submit the form and payment to the deposit box. If you're paying by credit card or just want to complete the transaction in-person, you can go into the store and pay at the cash register, which is what we did. There is an office next to the registration box, but we don't know how often anyone is there. We didn't see anyone during our stay.
We chose a site at the end of one of the rows so we could have extra space. The hookups were nice, albeit we must warn you that the water spigot shoots straight into the air, so testing it caused rain to pour down on our heads. That was a new one. But, our site did indeed have a nice grassy area complete with a picnic table and even a grill (a tad close to the neighbor's sewer port, but hey, can't win 'em all). We weren't sure what to expect in terms of crowdedness, but when we arrived around 5PM, a fair amount of people had already set up camp.
We walked around the campground and noticed a few amenities, including a playground and a horseshoe pit (but don't ask me where you actually get the horseshoes to play). There is a sizeable tent camping area, which again begs the question of, who are they targeting? Customers who buy a tent and then walk across the parking lot to give it a test run? Campers who are passing through and need a place to stay before moving onto their destination? When we checked in at the store, the cashier pulled out a form that showed which sites were filled. Every other camper had a "1" next to their number of nights, and the cashier even mistakenly charged us for only 1 night even though we said we were staying 2. It's clear that we were in the minority and most people do indeed use this campground as an overnight stop. That said, I think little amenities like a playground are a nice touch. If a family is on a long trip and they stop here, the kids have a place to play and let out some energy.
As for facilities, there is a laundry room, shower room, and bathrooms. To use these rooms, you need a code from the staff, which we didn't get, but I was able to sneak a look at the women's bathroom at one point when it was unlocked. Nice and clean! There is also a dump station for campers who choose electric-only sites. If you don't want to pay for the full service campground, there is still an overnight parking lot across the street, closer to the store. It has a dump and fill area as well.
As campers staying for 2 nights, was there anything to do in the area? Actually, yes! First off, if you need provisions or to grab a bite to eat, there are plenty of restaurants, gas stations, and stores such as Safeway and Walmart nearby. We decided to head into downtown Sidney and grab dinner at Sam & Louie's, a pizza/pasta regional chain that we were looking forward to trying. We parked in a free public lot right by the train tracks, and we noticed that the town square (we use that term loosely) had some displays talking about the town's history. It was really cool to read about Sidney and its reputation as a rather sinful stop along the Oregon Trail. Once known for its brothels and (ahem) murders, a series of events helped to boost its economy and give it a nice makeover. One of those events? The construction of the headquarters of an outdoor outfitter in the 1960s. It's called Cabela's. You may have heard of it. Now the town is rated as one of the top rural towns in the country, and we must say, the sections we saw were adorable. Residential streets lined with bungalows and lovely little apartments, and an a quaint main street that served as our view as we had our dinner, which was delicious. Our goal was to have leftovers that we could heat up in a pinch in a hotel room after dropping off our trailer to be serviced a couple of days later. The plan worked like a charm; we got big portions of easy-to-reheat food, and we had the added bonus of a night on the town in a very unexpected place.
The next morning, I took my walk around the campground and store. In front of the store, next to the front parking lot was a pond with a trail and gazebo. It wasn't the most peaceful morning walk, but it was a heck of a lot better than some campground walks I've endured! If I could ignore the sounds of traffic and could just focus on the ducks, it was actually quite pleasant.
I also noticed during my walk that a maintenance guy was driving around with some landscaping equipment. I appreciated seeing that they maintain the grounds - something even expensive RV parks don't always do.
We didn't expect to get great nights' sleeps while we were there, mainly because we were situated between I-80 and a major business route, and we expected lots of our neighbors to be hitching up bright and early, but honestly, it wasn't all that bad. Traffic noise doesn't bother us too much, and most of the neighbors didn't leave until later in the morning. We looked around for specific check-in and check-out times but didn't find any. We noticed that soon after our night 1 neighbs moved out, our night 2 neighbs moved in. It never mattered because the campground never filled up, but our 2nd night, which was a Thursday night, got quite a bit more crowded than the night before.
What were we able to conclude from our stay at this interesting campground? Yes, it's definitely mainly used by overnighters, but we had no issues staying longer. In fact, if we needed to be in the area for even a handful of days, we'd be totally fine setting up camp here. Would we stay here a week? Probably not unless we had to, and they wouldn't let us stay for longer because the campground has a 7-night maximum. Would we make this campground a destination? Absolutely not. We liken it to those small RV parks right alongside the highway that look like no-frills little stops. They're a step above a lot-dock style overnight because they offer designated sites, hookups, and oftentimes other amenities, but they're not a campground you'll be writing all your friends about (although we're kind of doing that right now with this place, aren't we?!). We think this campground did a great job at blending the quick overnight with more of a campground feel, unlike Loves, who seems to be spending money on state-of-the-art amenities that no one really cares about. And, the damage here at Cabela's was much easier to swallow than the $50+ we hear Loves RV Parks are charging. Our rate was just over $40/night with our Good Sam discount. For full hookups, 50 amp electricity, and an actual campsite with grass and a picnic area, we felt this was pretty reasonable.
And so, our short jaunt through Nebraska was full of unexpected successes. Cabela's turned out to be the perfect place for us to gear up for the next big adventure: Leaving our RV for a week and becoming displaced in Denver.
Campground:
Cabela's Full-Service Campground
Site 18, Full hookups (5oamp)
Picnic table, grill
First-come, first-served
Campground recommended? Yes
Site recommended? Yes