Sully Creek State Park

The park is a great option if you can’t get into TRNP or don’t want to for some reason.

Site 14 is a wonderful site for tent camping especially. One obvious spot for your tent is nestled in the trees. There’s another potential spot a little deeper in the woods. The other spot doesn’t have as much privacy as the other two potential spots for tent camping do.

There was some poison ivy encroaching the site in several places.

There is water near the entrance to the tent camp area however from site 14 the only bathroom nearby is quite a bit of a walk. Maybe we missed one closer but the only bathroom we found anywhere close by was over by the horse camp. The map online confirms it.

There was a fire ban in effect when we were there which nearly everyone ignored. There was no park staff around when we arrived after 8 pm to alert. Most people respected an idea of quiet hours but it was not the quietest camp site I’ve ever stayed at.

Nice park. Open space. Price was $25/night plus a $5.80 for a booking fee, which is a bit steep for electric only... but it was a great experience. There is potable water on site and a dump station. Toilets are only pit toilets, but there are pay showers that are in good condition with hot water. There are a couple of other campgrounds that are a little closer (the area is small, so everything is really close); we might have considered one of those if we needed full hook ups that night... but because electric only was fine for our stop, it was a good choice. We walked through their tent campsites and they have some really pretty ones.

No At&t. Strong Verizon.

This is not quite a review.
The following information about Alfred Sully that I found interesting is from Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Sully

Afred Sully was a Civil War general in 1861.

After being relieved of command, Sully went west and gained notoriety for committing several massacres against natives. On September 3, 1863, at Whitestone Hill, Dakota Territory, as reprisal for the Dakota Conflict of 1862, his troops destroyed a village of some 500 tipis that lodged Yankton, Dakota, Hunkpapa and Sihasapa Lakota. Warriors, along with women and children, were killed or captured. The troopers' casualties were small

From September 1856 through May1857, Sully was posted to Fort Pierre, Nebraska Territory (now South Dakota). He met and, by Sioux tribal custom, married a young French-Yankton girl of the Yankton Sioux tribe. With this marriage, Sully became the son-in-law of Saswe, a.k.a. François Deloria (Saswe being the Dakota pronunciation of François), a powerful Yankton medicine man and chief of the "Half-Breed band".

Sully's daughter by his Yankton Sioux wife, Mary Sully, was known as Akicita Win (Soldier Woman).[6] She married Rev. Philip Joseph Deloria, an Episcopal priest, a.k.a. Tipi Sapa (Black Lodge), a leader of the Yankton/Nakota band of the Sioux Nation.[7] Tipi Sapa is featured as one of the 98 Saints of the Ages at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., as the first Dakota Christian minister to his own people.[8] Among their descendants are Yankton Sioux Ella Deloria, an ethnologist, and her nephew Vine Deloria, Jr., a scholar, writer, author of Custer Died for Your Sins[9]

A peaceful place near the river with access to coyote howls at night as well as a section of the Maah-Daah-Hey Trail.

The Whitetail Flats Area, which has electric, can fit any size rig very easily. The sites are spaced far, far apart and are pancake-flat.

The Cedar area is primitive and more treed and the sites are closer together. Our 25 foot box would have fit in some, but not all, those sites and the overhanging limbs would have been a little challenging with our 11 foot roof.

The showers give great hot water for 12.5 cents a minute.

You must reserve online for camping thru the NDSP site.

(Stayed 9/14/20). This campground is really 3 areas in one state park. Whitetail Flats, where we camped, was a wide-open area without trees for shade. We had a corner site that was back-in (one of the few) so we had trees on one side and a view of the mountains and fields behind us. Seems like private land was behind us, separated by a small split rail fence. The site was very private, level, and had plenty of space. The campground was very quiet. Deer wandered around in the woods next to us each night. We did not use the restrooms or showers so no comment there. Dump station had potable water as well. An added bonus was the recent installation of electric hookups which, I am guessing was done so that in the warmer months, campers don't have to run their generators.

The other 2 areas are quite different than Whitetail. One is a horse-only area. As the CG is right on the popular Maah-daah-hey trail, many campers were staying with their horses. The other area, Cedar, is heavily treed and was much cooler. Our friends site (22) was not too level and not much of a pull-thru with trees guarding each end of the site. But, it was nice and shaded. The Cedar area does not have electric.

In addition to the camping fee, you are supposed to pay a $7 a day state park fee (which we did). There was no host in the CG but the ranger station is adjacent. You are able to purchase wood from the ranger.

Sully is convenient to the town of Medora and the south unit of Theodore Roosevelt NP. We had planned to camp at TRNP but the campground did not open during the Summer of COVID. It was good we had a reservation at Sully as the campground was full. Our friends booked the last available spot and that was about a month before our arrival.

The good news is that Whitetail flats campground sites now have 50 amp electric! Good thing because this campground is not shaded and you may want your a/c in summer. Sites are level and are pull through, looping off the road. Sites here are very far apart. Pay showers and pit toilets.
Folks should know that the privately owned Red Creek campground at the edge of town is adjacent to a railroad track with a fair amount of traffic.

The place was okay and most likely more desirable during the regular season however being there in the off season it felt a bit expensive for a place with no amenities. Paying $7 day use fee over the $12 camping fee at the end of October was, for me, a bit too much. That said, one other person was camped in the entire place so that was nice.

We paid $19 per night ($12 for camping and $7 for day pass). From the previous reviews, I didn't think this campground would have a lot of traffic, but it did while we were there (nights of September 10-14). The night of the 14th, both the Whitetail Flats and Cedar campgrounds were full. Campers were parking in the horse corral area. There is a .4 mile dirt road to reach the entrance to the campground. The road had some ruts/potholes, but was manageable. There is a self pay station at the entrance to the park. The board with the list of available campsites was not updated regularly during our 5 day stay. It's probably best to check online to see what's available. However, if sites are reserved for a particular date, the park ranger puts a note on the post with the dates. Interior roads of the park are dirt/gravel and sites are either dirt/gravel or hard packed dirt/grass. Sites are flat and fairly level. There's easy access for big rigs. We stayed in the Whitetail Flats campground. Sites in the Whitetail Flats campground area are spacious. I believe site 1 is the camp host site. Sites 2-6 are clearly pull-throughs on dirt/gravel, but sites 7, 8 and 9 could be either pull-through or back-in; they're on hard packed dirt/grass. Site 10 is a pull-through on hard packed dirt/grass, although it could be a back-in for a very short RV. The campground is very quiet and peaceful, but it can be a bit dusty. Cedar campground has a 40' wide, 10' height limit, but we saw 5th wheels that were higher than 10' in that campground. Cedar campground has many trees; sites are relatively spacious there too. Little Muddy Breaks sites have horse corrals at each site. There is a vault toilet in each campground. The dump station/water fill is conveniently located and has easy access. Verizon cell and data worked fine for us while there. All in all a beautiful place. We would stay again if passing through the area.