How would you rate the State Parks in your state?

[mmeier71]

The state parks in Minnesota (I've only camped in 4-5) are great.  Clean restrooms, decent campground roads, large sites (with significant shade as appropriate), and at least 30% of the sites are not reservable (first-come, first-serve).

But the best part is that Minnesota uses it's own reservation system, not Re$erveAmerica!  :-()

Austin

Gotta agree with AB here.. Minnesota State Park are great places.. I camped out at Crow Wing State park two years back when they just had the worst storms with trees blown over and etc. On the day I went up there, I found the State workers working their asses off to clear out every site they possibly could with tree debris before the big NHRA weekend in Brainerd.

Awesome state park with open sites that are first come, first serve.  Love their reservation system.... 90 day window. Cheap too!!

[goforit75]

Love the Penna. State Parks, they run the gambit of old, but maintained to new and clean.

Rich

[SpeakEasy]

I think this was a great topic for a poll! I'm enjoying reading the responses.

Up to now, if I've not missed anything, we have responses from eleven states:

AR
CA
CO
GA
ME
MI
MN
MO
NJ
NY
PA

What about the rest? Can we get responses from all 50 states???

-Speak

[Medic118]

This was a bit of a tough vote for me. The parks themselves are excellent! However, the people who run them tend to be way too permissive for my taste. It is common to have campers who have loud music playing, and it is not unusual to find young people having big beer-drinking parties on weekends. The management seems to be OK with this behavior. I've camped all over the country, and I've never experienced this anywhere else.

-Speak

I agree  with this statement about new yorks parks. We go to Luzerne quite a bit and every year they seem to get louder. When you complain to the staff they act like they have no idea what you are talking about.

[garym053]

The 7 Vermont State Campgrounds that I've stayed in have all been very well run and clean. Even though some of these campgrounds were built by the CCC in the 30's!

[brainpause]

I responded with TN parks, so add that one to your list!

Larry

[SpeakEasy]

I responded with TN parks, so add that one to your list!

Larry

Well, Larry; I'm really puzzled. I've looked the posts over from top to bottom a few times, and I can't find a post from you about TN parks. Whassup?

-Speak

[AustinBoston]

Well, Larry; I'm really puzzled. I've looked the posts over from top to bottom a few times, and I can't find a post from you about TN parks. Whassup?

-Speak

Maybe, like several others, he only voted, not posted.  As of this post, there are 42 votes, and only 23 posts.

Austin

[mtjeeper]

As stated before, the Colorado parks are VERY nice. Clean, well spaced sites, great facilities. BUT my complaint is that some of them are completely reservable, meaning we can't spontaniously go up on a Wed or Thurs to get an empty site making for a 3-4 day weekend. Golden Gate Canyon is this way. Some parks have a couple first come first serve sites but not many.

My only complaint.

Matt

[trumpet87]

I live in Indiana and I rate our parks good as far as cleanliness, stuff to do, etc. But the price, OUCH!  We just paid $28 a night for Memorial weekend. PLUS we had to pay the $5 fee to drive thru the gate! I think that is too much. I have checked other states and they are sometimes almost half of that. I think on non holiday periods, weekend or not, it is still $24 here. So how much is it in your state?

[Walt H]

We've only stayed in two of the state parks here in Idaho so far, but they've both been very enjoyable experiences. On holiday weekends, the park seem to put on extra activities to help keep kids interested. Memorial Day weekend, we stayed at Bruneau Dunes State Park, and they had opportunities for the kids to catch pond critters and look at planets in the observatory.

Our first big trip in the pop-up (more than three nights) will also be to a state park - for a week, and I expect that will be enjoyable as well.

How many states are we up to now?

[cyclone]

I'll reply about TN state parks - for the most part, excellent camping!  Some are better than others, of course.  Most have w/e in all but the "rustic sites".  The bathrooms are generally in decent shape.  Some need updating, but they are clean.  I have visited a couple of parks I would not want to camp in, but only because the cg was really outdated and looked like it would very difficult to level.  I think we have camped in 12 state parks here; and I would return to all of them. (and have, in many cases).  There are many more on my list to try.  The downside is that they still do not accept reservations, except for a handful of the parks.

[campdaddy]

This was a bit of a tough vote for me. The parks themselves are excellent! However, the people who run them tend to be way too permissive for my taste. It is common to have campers who have loud music playing, and it is not unusual to find young people having big beer-drinking parties on weekends. The management seems to be OK with this behavior. I've camped all over the country, and I've never experienced this anywhere else.

-Speak

I've only stayed at about 1/2 dozen different Ohio State Parks and we've visited a few more. They are usually well maintained but the amenities vary greatly from one park to another. Some parks have semi-secluded sites and some parks have them stacked one right next to the other without any trees.  I

[jhart]

We've camped in several state parks here in GA and they've all been great.  As dcampbell says, the only problem is not being able to choose your site until you get to the park.  We've also stayed in several in FL and really like them.  I also like reserving a particular site (maybe GA will take a hint from it's southern neighbors!)

[mjsmith1223]

Another vote for Michigan State Parks being great.  Some we like more than others, mostly due to personal preferences (e.g. does it have a beach, what's close by, etc.)

We've stayed at a couple of Minnesota State Parks.  They were all top notch.  Ditto with West Virgina.

Mike