Santa Ana River Lakes — Attraction in Anaheim

I’ve been here a total of three time for overnight fishing with my family ($105 for family mom, dad and three kids). I really really wanted to like this camping and fishing location since it’s local, not too far drive, no reservations, and relaxing environment. TODAY IS MY LAST TIME HERE. I went to use the bathroom/portapotty AND I LITERALLY ALMOST DIED. If I went into there without no light/just a phone light. I probably would’ve gotten bitten by the nest and hordes of BLACK WIDOWS. I was very fortunate that my husband had a headlamp and all the necessary lighting to see this nightmare and tell me to not take another step! He grabbed his torch and cleaned everything up, meaning burn the entire thing and clean it up. BLACK WIDOWS were everywhere in the portapotty (corners, in the toilet, on the floor). It was so bad I wanted to throw up and cry. I am not an emotional person but to see the condition of the “facility” is sad. What if a child went in? What if someone didn’t see and really needed to go? What if the bad really happened?

Secondly, yes. They say they fill the lake every Thursday but every time I am here overnight. With everyone fishing…. We only caught 1-2 fish per trip. So don’t expect to be catching many fish because the “lake is full of fish”. Bring food and water because you will get hungry if you don’t catch any fish. It is true,the lake is full of fish, using a fish sonar, there are many fish in the lake but they are mostly 15-20ft underwater and cruising. They do not want to eat the bait/food if the many groups of fish are that deep underwater.

Thirdly, it is pricey for what it is and what they offer. With the price of admission I would expect basic facilities like WORKING, CLEAN, MAINTAINED, AND BLACK WIDOW FREE BATHROOMS WITH SINKS.

Forth, lots of bugs and THORNY bushes around the lake. Sunblock, bug spray, make fire, cut bushes to make a pathway from camp to lake. It can be slippery and slopes when getting your fish from lake to above ground and/or reel/line/hook when reeling in and casting. Management should maintain the grounds better.

Fifth, on this trip. My son left his phone on top of our cooler. We only noticed his phone was missing because his ringtone was on loud/high and it was ringing down the way and not in the area. A neighboring fishing family who were also staying the night had my son’s phone. Apparently when the other mom and kids were walking, her kids STOLE my sons phone off our cooler. The other mom claimed she didn’t know anything about her son taking my sons phone off our cooler IN OUR AREA. SO NOW, we cannot leave our camping gear, tables and chairs out anymore because people can walk by and lurk at your things. So tonight we unpacked and repacked our gear back into our vehicles. Never in my entire camping experience have I ever gotten anything stolen. WHO DOES THAT? REALLY?! A phone?!

Lastly, I do like this fishing and campsite because you can have a relaxing time with family watching the sunset and calm waters. COMPAINT: too many drivers here speed by all throughout the night. They should remind drivers to drive slow and cruise when inside the lakes/grounds. Speeding cars kick up lots of dirt, dust, and possibly can cause accidents. Rowdy people/groups is a hit or miss when they camp next to you. People do come here to drink, party, and get drunk. So it can get loud from noises, talking, music, and most dangerous is when you have drunk people driving and speeding within the compound/grounds.

I will not be coming here with my family anymore unfortunately. I do not feel safe using “the provided facilities” currently full of black widows. I hope management takes this review seriously and be able to have a solution and providing a clean, well lit, managed, and working bathroom/restroom for all their visitors. Warning all viewers and visitors coming here to be aware of your surroundings and...

I am an experienced trout fisherman. I've caught several big fish in the eastern sierras, Utah, and other small lakes around California. And after coming to SARL I can assure you that you are wasting your time and money. One look at the water in these lakes will tell you that you made a mistake. You can't see more than 1 foot into the water because it is so muddy and brown.

They supposedly stock every Thursday and my friends and I came on a Saturday morning (1-23-16). The day before, Friday, my friend's uncle had spent the whole day fishing and saw two fish caught from 6am to 4pm. He caught none, but we decided to go anyway.

On Saturday we fished from 630am to 4pm at two different spots on each lake. I tried different rigs, classic sinker, dropshot, and bobber. I tried every thing I had in my tackle box (three or four different colors/patterns for each) - powerbait dough, power worms, micetails, power eggs, jigs, we bought live nightcrawlers (inflated and uninflated). Nothing. I took their lip ripperz hatchery dust and mixed it in with the powerbait dough, and I even tried covering every bait in lip ripperz love sauce. Nothing. I finally tried lures. Nothing. We talked to other people fishing, and throughout the whole day, we heard of 5 fish caught. Keep in mind this was on a Saturday with some 500-600 people fishing, including those who were out on boats. I couldn't believe it.

I have to note, when I went to the tackle shop to buy nightcrawlers, the borderline obese cashier could barely string together sentences and give me correct change because he was so stoned. I would not recommend this as a good place to bring kids, unless you want them in a ghetto, dirty, drug-ridden environment.

Maybe some days you go here and catch a few fish. Maybe one would be good size. I'm sure it happens sometimes, and that's what draws people. However, spending $25 per person and getting skunked for almost 12 hours is unacceptable for a private lake that claims to stock as much as they do. Even if you've come here and caught fish before, taking the chance of coming here, wasting $25 and an entire day of your life for no fish is just ludicrous. I won't be coming back and I recommend you...

I have been coming to this lake since I was a little kid about 40 yrs now. Me my dad family and friends have always caught something we always invited people to come fish with us and made first timers weekly fisherman cause it was a blast to catch a fish.. BUT now i would say the past 6 yrs the fishing has been Terible we take are family and friends and some more first timers Like my kids and their friends and have about 12 poles out and wait all day to catch 1 or 2 fish and many other times we get skunked not even a bite. My father always said you don't always catch something their will be bad days that's part of fishing.. but now he hates this lake everyday we fish is a bad day. Now that this lake is the the only option now that anaheim and corona are closed and have been for a while. I believe they take advantage of that weather they over drug or under stock they know we will be back because of hope and no other options of big lakes to fish. Alot of people come here and make them alot of money it ain't cheap it went up alot over the past several years. So we all put food on their table by still coming to santa ana lake so how about they return the favor and put some food aka Fish on ares and make it enjoyable again and alow the new generation to become fisherman instead of hating fishing like my kids and...