There are 5 Water Management Districts in Florida, and each district is run by an organization tasked with managing our water resources, meaning flood protection, managing water during shortages, digging wells, recharging aquifers, etc.
To do this job the Water Management Districts buy up large tracts of land that are strategic to water management, which also prevents those lands from being run over by asphalt, strip malls and over-sized housing projects.
The positive side effect for people like me–other than making sure all our water sources aren’t covered over with fast food joints–is that these lands remain undeveloped and open to the public–hiking, hunting, trotting, birding, fishing, biking, and camping.
For starters, here are the 5 Water Management Districts (with direct links to their websites):
Northwest Florida Water Management District
St. John’s River Water Management District
South Florida Water Management District
Southwest Florida Water Management District
Suwannee River Water Management District
Out of the 5 Districts, 4 allow camping–you are out of luck if you want to camp on Suwannee River District Lands (but you can still hike, fish, paddles, etc.).
Also, Northwest and South allows RV camping, and as far as I can tell that is free too, along with tent camping.
Reserving a camping site for each of the Districts vary, but all of them involve going to their respective website, finding the “Recreation” tab, and making an online reservation. Calling in the old fashioned way is possible as well, and you may get better information that way too, as far as finding the best sites.
Northwest Florida Water Management District Camping
For camping in the Northwest District, the best place to start is at their useful Recreation Activities Matrix that outlines what recreational activities can be done on which lands.
When you find a place that looks good on the matrix, just click the arrow symbol next to the site’s name and you will be brought to camplife.com to book the reservation for free.
(I experimented trying to book an RV site…and it actually looks like there are free RV sites available, but since I don’t own an RV it’s possible that I missed something. I would love to hear from from somebody in the comments if they had any success booking an RV site.)
St. John’s Water Management District Camping
The best way to find available campsites for St. John’s is at the St. John’s section of the camplife website. There are 23 different tracts of land listed that are available for camping.
Pick the tract that looks good to you and book it on the camplife website.
No RV camping available.
Southwest Florida Water Management District Camping
The best starting point is going here, which is a search results page on the Southwest Florida website for “camping.” You will have to make an online account to book any of the sites.
No RV camping, although (as seen in the below picture) I did see camp trailers during one of my stays. Maybe it can be arranged via phone? I did not see any RV hookups.
(This is my home district and have done some first-hand camping and hiking on these lands. They are FANTASTIC!).
South Florida Water Management District Camping
A little bit different. You have to fill out an online Special Use License Application (very easy, quick and free) for the site you would like to camp at. Start by going here and clicking the “click here to access the online application” link. You will have to make an online account before being able to proceed with the application.
There are 5 sites for RV camping–DuPuis Equestrian Campground, Hickory Hammock Equestrian Campground, Istokpoga Canal Boat Ramp Campground, Spoil Equestrian Campsite (KICCO,) and Town of KICCO Campsite–and all the rest are tent only camping.
(As far as I can tell, RV camping is free. I filled out an RV application all the way to the “submit” button and there was never a payment page. If anybody has success, please leave a comment so we have more data points!).
I hope everybody gets out there and explores the Water Management District Lands! Boring sounding name, but spectacular (and free to explore) lands!
Obviously, I won’t be able to explore and post about every single district land, so I hope that people chime in about their experiences in the comments below–thanks!
