Entrance to the park!
Ortona is an almost-perfect little campground on the Okeechobee Waterway; what would make it perfect is if it was FHU.
Ortona is roughly two-thirds from La Belle to Clewiston on the north side of a huge cow pasture. Or it’s halfway from Nowhere and BFE but things are changing. SR 80 is being four-laned and ranches are being turned into developments with a capital D. And every one of them will have a friggin golf course.
Lane by lot 13 and the bathhouse!
Anyway, the Garmin gal tried to make us turn through a farm gate onto a non-road. You want to turn on Dalton Road, not Goodno Road no matter what the blithering bitch (Miss Garmin) might say. And we wended our way through the cows to Ortona South camppground provided by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers.
A tug boat pushing a tug boat through the locks!
It’s 51 sites in two loops and all are long; they’re not only big-rig friendly, some are two-rig friendly. All sites have a _covered_ picnic table and a fire ring/bbq pit. While the roads are blacktop the sites are concrete and are perfectly level. The shower houses are ship-shape.
One could say there’s not a whole lot to do. That depends on your perspective. You could piddle around on your 3G or 4G internet or you could go outside and watch boats go through the lock and if you’re really ambitious you could go down to the fishing pier a drown bait while watching boats go through the lock.
Beautiful Palms through out the park!
What’s really to do is BE WARM IN WINTER! There’s a crowd that meets here every winter. Unfortunately there’s a 14-day limit.
BTW Ortona North appears to be a boat launch and rec area but you can’t get there from here.
Directions to Ortona South Campground:
Campground Office is at N26º 47′ 15.00″ W81º 18′ 28.98″. The physical address is 2410 Dalton Lane SW, Moore Haven, FL 3347
Phone: 863-675-8400
From LaBelle, travel 10 miles east on Highway 80, turn north on Dalton Lane and follow into campground.
From Clewiston, travel 9 miles north on Highway 27 to Highway 80. Follow Highway 80 west for 14 miles to Dalton Lane, turn north and follow into campground.
Contact Info
863-983-8101
SFOO@usace.army.mil