D.A.R. State Park — Attraction in Addison

Upon arrival the park “manager” was EXTREMELY rude but asking if I’d ever camped before, that’s not how you greet your guests! We had a site that was for a party of 8 and it seemed ok when we got set up and all of my grandchildren were playing it was light out at that time. We were having a fantastic time and being respectful and quiet when dark approached, at a few minutes after 10pm Pam the park “manager” came around on her bike and stopped and told us we needed to quiet down we could be heard from 6 camp sites away!! I’m sorry but that wasn’t true, all 6 grandchildren were sleeping and we didn’t want to wake them. About 10 minutes later this Pam lady comes back around on her bike with a huge spot light and told us that we were still being too loud we could be heard now from 2 camp sites away, again NOT TRUE the children were still sleeping soundly! And the final straw was when she came immediately back was hiding in the bushes behind our tents and popped out shined the spotlight in my face I kindly asked her to remove the light from my face and she refused, she wanted to speak with the person who rented the site, she took my daughter whom is 7 months pregnant completely out of sight around the back of the tent which we couldn’t see her or my daughter but could clearly hear her being extremely rude to my daughter Pam was yelling which then woke up the children and they were crying and scared! She yelled as she was riding away that she was calling the police and having us ALL physically removed at 11pm for doing nothing but sit around a small campfire! Not only was this lady rude, disrespectful and nasty but she was way beyond perfessional… now we have children awake crying and yes now making noise due to her yelling. The next morning the people across the road camping came over and told us they were extremely sorry that she treated us in the manner that she did and they felt badly that happened!! The whole situation was terrible that was clearly unnecessary and this woman shouldn’t be shinning bright lights in people’s faces, what if one of us had epilepsy and she triggered a massive seizure?? That would be a lawsuit on there state park!! NONE of our family will ever camp there again, and this Pam shouldn’t be working for the state parks she’s very rude and yells very loud I almost called the police on her for harassment it was that bad!! If I want to camp in peace and quiet we will go elsewhere or camp on my lawn!! I’d give a 0 star if I could…. MORAL OF THE STORY: DON’T STAY AT DAR STATE PARK UNLESS YOU GO TO BED BEFORE DARK, YOU WILL...

Well, this state park was mediocre, moderate, meh.

The good Clean washrooms Nice to have the lean-to Liked having a place to wash dishes. Having a Saturday night movie was fun (though it started 20 mins earlier than we were told.)

The bad Vermont gets a lot of rain. There was a lot of gumbo clay rich mud in front of the lean-to. Mud everywhere. A truckload of gravel on front of the lean-to and around the fire pit would do wonders. Strangely enough, I saw piles of gravel. Could it be used for that? A rain gutter on the lean-to would be cheap and make the stay nicer if raining. The water was silty. No beach. I don't mind a rocky shore but the zebra mussels ruined that. Sooooo many zebra mussels. Worse than the Great Lakes. To be fair, this is no marks against the park but campers beware. The woman (Ranger Pam) who is the park ranger needs to chill out. It is a state park, not where fun goes to die. She bikes around like Carry Nation, giving people hell for making any noise at all.

It was sub par. Would I go back?...

We love the DAR camping area, but have repeatedly had negative encounters of park staff (Pam, specifically). She asked a friend of mine (who booked the site) to talk with her regarding our noise levels, and pulled her aside for a walk, in the dark, mind you, to talk. Pam initially refused to let my friend’s husband join them on the walk, but backtracked once he mentioned that he was her husband — odd. She threatened to kick us off of the campsites, “when are you guys leaving?” “tomorrow morning” “well I can shorten your stay right now” — despite us just roasting marshmallows by the fire. This is the second time we’ve had a negative encounter with Pam (we go to DAR every summer), and this type of rudeness is unacceptable. We understand there are rules, but Pam’s attitude is unacceptable and felt very unwelcoming. We’ll be taking our yearly summer...