Bear Den Campground

The great advantage to this campground is its location: right on the Blue Ridge Parkway, near Spruce Pine, NC. It's hard to go wrong when the Blue Ridge mountains are your backdrop! (The photo at right was taken from the parkway not far from the campground. The campground is not visible from the parkway.) This was a great little get-away, the staff were all very welcoming and friendly, and they offered just enough of everything in our opinion. But if you are looking for a resort with top-of-the-line amenities, well, it's no KOA!

We thought the sites were a bit rustic, offering water and electricity but our site at least was not terribly level. They were pretty close together, but also fairly secluded by trees and the rolling hills on which the campground is perched. Each site had a nice deep firepit and a picnic table, though the tables were somewhat "aged."

The campground offers a very small lake, with proportionally small beach, with boat rentals and fishing. There is a game room and a rec center, which offers seasonal entertainment. The camp store is stocked with basic necessities and of course ice and firewood are available. The kids enjoyed the large centrally located playground. Bathrooms were clean but a bit far from where we were.

Some friends stayed in one of their camping cabins, which were clean and seemed to be fairly new, but absolutely bare-bones, consisting of a double bed and two bunks which appeared to be more narrow than a standard twin. Electric lights, mattresses, and an outside picnic table and fire pit were the only provisions.

Scoring:
Site: 2 (#D16, about as far as you can get from the bathrooms, and not level; but other sites may have been better)
Amenities: 4 (playground, game room, rec center, beach, lake, more amenities than your standard campground but not of "resort-quality" standard.)
Bathrooms: 4 (clean, showers offered changing area)

Overall: 10

Fort Mountain State Park

Fort Mountain is a great state park with a lot of things to do. In addition to the "mystery" of the park, there are lots of trails for hiking, biking, and horseback riding, a small lake with a little bit of beach, fishing, boating, playgrounds, all kinds of fun stuff to do. It's quite a steep, winding mountain road to reach the park, however.

The weekend we were here the campground was pretty well packed, and we ended up with the camp site nearest the entrance, naturally not our first choice. At least it was a pull-through. All the sites were nice and shady, though a bit close together. There were a lot of families around, so there were plenty of kids to make friends with. The campground is also within walking distance of the lake, playground, picnic areas, mini-golf and concessions.

The sites were all in good repair, lacking only sewer connections. The dump station was pretty far away I guess if you are in a bigger trailer, but there was a sink drain close to the bathrooms where we were able to dispose of our small amount of gray water. Though the bathrooms were spacious, one of the two shower stalls was in a state of disrepair which I sadly did not know about until it was too late. Also, being such a busy weekend, it was hard to keep them really sparkling. The camp store is not especially well-stocked but it carries the basics and emergency supplies, which is nice since you have to drive to the foot of the mountain to reach any sort of civilization.

Scoring:

Site: I'd give ours a 3, but much nicer ones are to be had if you get in early enough.
Amenities: 5
Bathrooms: 3, due to broken shower

Overall: 11