Beaver Creek Valley State Park — Attraction in La Crescent

I wish I could give Beaver Creek a better rating, as I have been coming here since I was a little kid, and have many many good memories here. I was a regular camper at this campground, camping almost every weekend here, so far this summer with my daughter and bf. Our last camping experience this past weekend here was very traumatic and we could have lost our lives. A huge tree at the campsite we were at fell from the hill aiming right towards my daughter and I and it landed on us! This tree was HUGE and covered our entire site, it was very scary and could have had a very different outcome!! Although I understand that these things happen, the park ranger in the office, did not seem bothered by what had happened to us. When it was mentioned that the tree ruined our expensive tent (that we may not be able to get replacement pieces for), she responded “well that’s nature so we don’t pay for tent damage.” She then walked out of the office and offered my bf a free night of camping to make up for what happened! What a slap in the face when she was JUST INFORMED of our tent being ruined by the tree! I also feel this whole situation could have been avoided if the grounds were maintained better for bad tree! I will continue to camp here for the fact I have already paid for reservations for next weekend, Fourth of July weekend, and Labor Day weekend. After these already paid for reservations, I will no longer be camping here due to the uncaring response of the park ranger and their inability to make things right when we were rightly, very upset about this situation. I will no longer recommend this campground to people anymore, as before I had nothing but great things to say about the place. This ruined Beaver...

Stayed two nights this week. While there are some beautiful walking trails – the Beaver Creek Trail for example, is a long, relatively flat trail that follows along the river - I can only give this campground 2-3 stars for several reasons. Trails are not marked well for difficulty and the Plateau Rock Trail should have been definitely marked Difficult. Made it to the top, but the vista was blocked by overgrown brush. I’ve stayed in several well-maintained State Parks, however this one did not strike me as being well kept. The brush was not trimmed back sufficiently between very tight campsites (ours was #18) and all the picnic tables really need a good power washing, most of them are nearly black. Our friend was in site #17, and walnuts literally rained down on us around the campfire. One dented his camp stove and another actually hit him. Falling walnuts from a 100 ft tree hit hard and are no joke. Perhaps this site should not be available during this season. There is no way I would have kept my RV parked in this site if it had been ours. The campground firewood was more like a pack of kindling which burned down very quickly. Most unfortunate, the black-legged deer ticks were thick everywhere we hiked and in the campsite! We removed 11 from 2 dogs in 2 days. Perhaps the managers could consider treating for these at least throughout the campground area. Wish I could leave a better review, but also feel it is important for management to consider that there are improvements to be made if you’d like...

This was our second stay at the park, first time in the cabin. We stayed from a Sunday through a wednesday, so the campground was not very busy at all. I really enjoyed the camper cabin, and it was close to the lovely nearby spring and creek. Saw some decent sized trout, although we didn't fish. The restrooms have vault toilets and the showers had hot water. The restroom / shower area does need some cleaning and updating, but it does fine considering you are camping and can expect to rough it a bit. The only other slight negative was the garbage was about 50 yards away and was filled up while we were there...by Wednesday when we left, if the wind was blowing the wrong way there was a pretty unpleasant smell in our campsite, although you couldn't smell it from inside the cabin. I had fortunately brought incense along! I also highly recommend, whether you are tent camping or in a cabin, to bring a cassette toilet for convenience... We only use it for non solids, and use the campground toilet for anything else. It really makes a world of difference to not have to walk to the bathroom...