I hardly ever give a campground five stars, but for me, this one deserves five stars. It is not perfect, but which campground is? I was bouncing between four and five stars since there is no real camp store that I know of, and the tent pads are hard gravel. However, rating campgrounds is sometimes subjective. I feel, though, that this one deserves a 4.5.
Except for the beach area, the campground at this state park is fairly clean, and the park has taken measures to make sure people are safe from COVID-19. The restrooms and showers had tile floors and were clean. The staff members that I encountered were friendly and gave me the information I needed to know. There are two tenting areas and another area for RVs and tents, which provide water and electricity. We chose to be close to the water, however, and the walk from the car to the tent sites are no more than a hundred yards or so. Our site didn’t have water, but it was close. Electricity was not a concern since we have lanterns and the evenings this time of year are not hot. I loved the different framed-in gravel levels at the site we chose. This gave us more room for our tent and for other gear. Lower down at our tent site, there was a place for us to sit and enjoy the lake. This was especially great since it was almost a full moon when we were there.
There are several things to do, including hiking, but since I had my grandson, he enjoyed the water more. There is a large area to swim, but officially, there is no swim beach. I believe the park posts the signs for its own protection. There were well over a hundred people at the waterfront and many of them swimming or playing in the water. Kayaks and SUPs were available for rent for campers and for day visitors.
There are several places to launch your own kayak, and there is also a boat ramp area with at least three ramps. Although the day use areas were crowded, the campground was not overly packed, especially the tent area. The RV/tent sites were a combination of pull-throughs and back-ins. Most of them were spacious enough that there were RVs and tents at the same site. I was truly impressed with the arrangement of the individual campsites, although I thought they were a little too close to each other.
Overall, the campground at this state park is in good condition, and its proximity to Lake Jocassee scores bonus points for me. I would definitely recommend this campground.
