Bass Lake County Park and Campground encompasses 663 acres of red and white pine, spruce, aspen, and cedar off State Aid Highway 1, eleven miles east of Effie and eleven miles west of Togo. Managed by the Itasca County Land Department, the park was purchased by the county in 1984 from the Boise Cascade Corporation with the help of a federal Land and Water Conservation Fund grant. Four lakes lie within its borders: Bass and Duck each have a county boat ramp, Erskine is a carry-in trout lake stocked with rainbow trout and splake, and Sucker rounds out the set. Bass Lake itself runs 122 acres and 65 feet deep, holding smallmouth and largemouth bass, northern pike, and panfish.
The campground offers 43 sites, including six tent-only sites, each with a picnic table, fire grate, and tent pad or camper slot. Electric A-Loop sites currently run $30 a night, non-electric B-Loop sites $20, and tent sites $15, plus a $7 booking fee; reservations are made online, while sites 15B and 16B stay first-come, first-served with payboxes at the entrance kiosk and in the B Loop. Stays are limited to fourteen days. Campers will find three drinking-water wells, six privies — three of them ADA-compliant vault outhouses — a recycle station, firewood for sale at site 1A, and an RV dump station ($10 per use).
The swimming beach at the southeastern end of the grounds was refreshed in 2022 (no lifeguards — swim at your own risk), and the big triangular picnic area, rebuilt after a 1989 windstorm, now features tables, grills, an open-air pavilion, and a fishing pier with an ADA-compliant walkway added in 2025. Most park trails are multi-use — open to hikers, bikers, horseback riders, and off-highway vehicles under 1,000 pounds — and a hiker-only trail around the south half of Bass Lake makes a complete circle of the water. Inside the campground, ATVs may be used only to come and go.
