Bellevue State Park

The bluffs at Bellevue are part of the rugged, unglaciated country of the upper Mississippi, where the last ice sheets left this corner of Iowa untouched. The result is steeper, more dramatic terrain than the flat farmland farther west, with limestone cliffs rising several hundred feet above the river and offering long views up and down the valley.

From the overlooks you look out over one of the great working rivers of North America. The Mississippi here is managed by a system of locks and dams built in the 1930s to keep a navigable channel for barge traffic, and Lock and Dam No. 12 sits just below the park, where you can watch tows of barges rise and fall as they pass through.

One of the park's signature features is the Garden Sanctuary for Butterflies, a set of flower gardens planted to attract and feed butterflies through the summer. On a warm day the beds are alive with monarchs, swallowtails, and other species drifting among the blooms, and interpretive signs help visitors learn the plants and insects.

Beyond the garden, the park is laced with hiking trails through two units, the South Bluff and the Nelson unit. The paths wind along the bluff edges to overlook after overlook, dip into shaded ravines, and pass groves of oak and hickory, giving hikers a good sampling of the varied terrain of the driftless Mississippi bluffs.

The Nelson unit of the park preserves a group of ancient Native American burial mounds, low earthen forms built by ancestral Native peoples who lived along the Mississippi long ago. These mounds are part of a great tradition of mound building that stretches up and down the river valley, and they deserve to be treated with respect as sacred places.

The Mississippi bluffs are the ancestral homeland of the Meskwaki and Sauk peoples, along with the Ho-Chunk and other nations who lived and traveled along the river. Their descendants remain part of the region's living Native communities today, and sites like the mounds at Bellevue connect the modern park to thousands of years of human presence on these bluffs.

The town of Bellevue lies below the park at the river's edge, a small Mississippi River town with a historic main street, a riverfront park, and a working lock where visitors can watch barges pass. It sits on the Great River Road, the scenic route that follows the Mississippi through Iowa, linking a string of bluff towns from the Minnesota border south to the Missouri line.

This stretch of the river road is one of Iowa's most beautiful drives, threading between the river and the bluffs past overlooks, small towns, and preserves. Bellevue State Park is among its highlights, an easy place to stretch your legs, take in the view, and understand why the upper Mississippi has drawn travelers for generations.

The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.