Sunday, July 09, 2006

Black Rock Mountain State Park


Black Rock Mountain State Park is mostly undeveloped, and it is the natural beauty of the area that is the main draw. The campground is very popular and was full both nights that we stayed; I'd really recommend reservations. Like most state parks in Georgia, the sites were pretty much packed on top of one another. While there were some larger (longer) sites, it was asked that these be reserved for larger RVs/travel trailers. We managed to fit our camper and a tent at our site, which was one of the smaller ones, with no problem - it did not feel crowded.

The gravel pad was level, the table and fire ring were in good shape too. The bathrooms appeared to be fairly new and were roomy, although the water pressure from the commodes caused a pretty-much constant wetness on the floor. And, being peak season, the bathhouses were well-used. We couldn't get as hot a shower on Sunday as we did on Saturday.

One small annoyance was the camp store hours... they were very conveniently open until 10 at night, but did not open again until 2pm. Which made it difficult to reload our coolers with ice before leaving for our adventures in the morning. The nearest place to get ice outside the park was all the way down the mountain, at least a 15-minute drive or more.

The playground was near the visitor center/day use area, which was unfortunately on the other side of the park. But a couple of nice overlooks and trails were adjacent to/in walking distance from the campground.

Scoring:
Site: 3.5 (although it was small, it was far from being the smallest, and convenient to bathhouse)
Amenities: 3 (camp store and visitor center, playground)
Bathrooms: 4 (fairly new but heavily used)

Overall: 10.5