Black Hawk State Park — Attraction in Lake View

We rented the Blackhawk Cabin over Labor Day weekend and were forced to rent it for a minimum of 7 days since it was over a holiday weekend. Although we paid the full price to book for 7 days, we only stayed for 3 nights because of our bad experience. We'd never been to this park before, so booked based on the pictures and description online. My issue is not with the cabin itself, as it was quite clean and nice. Part of the problem is that the "cabin" is really just a house that is in the town, not actually in the state park. While it has a nice backyard surrounded with wooded area, when you walk out the front door you are literally in a town and you have to bike or drive to get to the lake, beach, etc. This is not what I expected staying in a cabin at a state park, and the pictures online don't clarify this. The town is the most boring town I've ever stayed in with only one restaurant, a crappy grocery store, and almost no other businesses. Multiple of the lakes here were almost completely covered in green algae, and it smelled so bad that I was literally gagging while trying to ride my bike past them. The beach sand was more like small rocks, and the waterline was choked with algae, seaweed, and dead fish. The water looked really dirty. The mosquitos here were some of the worst I've ever experienced, likely due to all the stagnant water and excessive rain. They made going on hikes and even bike riding miserable. My biggest issue is even though we had to rent the cabin for 7 days, there was nothing anywhere that said everything would close down the day after Labor Day. We tried to rent a boat at multiple nearby marinas, but they closed for the season on Labor Day. We tried to rent kayaks on Blackhawk Lake, but they closed after Labor Day. We couldn't even get concession food because they sold out of everything on Labor Day and weren't replenishing. I don't think it is reasonable to be held to a 7 day rental timeline if they don't keep the park's businesses open. Maybe if you have your own boat, don't mind the dirty water and mosquitos, and come prepared with your expectations, this lake and state park could be enjoyable, but it was miserable for us, and this is why we only stayed 3 of the 7 nights that...

I have only been here 2 times, but will return again one day, just not sure when. I only have 2 issues with Black Hawk Lake camping area. I don't like people walking through my campsite & looking at my stuff I have around my camper/picnic table/grill or what I have in the back of my pickup. (That is an invasion of my privacy.) The other really pisses me off is people who are out walking there dogs (don't get me wrong here, I love dog's) @ let them poop in other peoples campsites & then not clean it up. I clean up after my dog's when they poop when we are out walking around or at the campsite. I love to see people walking their dog's, they just need to clean up their dog's poop. I understand they can't clean up pee, but poop they can. I HATE stepping in poop that you can't see in the grass or that may be on the street. Then its on the bottom of your shoes & you don't know it's there till you get back to your campsite & go into your camper or tent & you get poo on the floor or whatever is on the floor (rugs, towels, clothes, ect...) I also have a 2 dog's that eats other dog's poop. (YES I NO IT IS GROSS & DISGUSTING.) But there are times it happens so quickly I don't have a chance to stop them. Please put it as a NEW STATE PARK Law/Rule. "PLEASE CLEAN UP AFTER YOUR DOG OR DOG'S POOP'S. OTHER CAMPERS WILL APPRECIATE IT A LOT." "There is a fine if you get caught or turned in be fellow camper's"

P.S. Put up posts about a block apart around camp that has a box on it that has poop clean up bags attached to it & a trash can for the owners to use so they don't have to carry a bag of poop around with them. A lot of City Parks have these posts around the park's. In Iowa & Nebraska, they are in a lot of the State Parks in & around Nebraska, not all of the park's have them yet. But I've seen them around. There working on getting ALL State & City Park's with them though. Also theres a FINE if they get caught or turned in for not cleaning up after their dog or dog's after they poop & just keep on walking. Thank you. Please help clean up your State Park of dog poop. ...

Beautiful site but ruined by the extremely “Rude-e” Judy camp host as we named her. Our boys have e-scooters which go the same speed as a bike (8mph) and are silent but as soon as my boys took them to a spin she immediately scolded them and said they couldn’t ride. All while there are dogs barking everywhere, kids riding with loud training wheels, a couple riding on ebikes (how is that different), someone working on a generator etc. My kids scooters don’t disturb anyone and aren’t fast. We of course followed the rules but the next day as we were taking our bikes and scooters off site to visit Lake View, she again scolded us as we were literally riding off the property (our site was right next to the road). Just completely unnecessary to treat our family so unwelcoming. Never had an issue like that in all our years of RVing. In addition, the bathroom showers have no adjustment and you have to push the button to keep water flowing every few seconds. The swimming area beach is absolutely unsanitary and littered with geese feces and doesn’t seem to be ever raked. Pretty pointless to even try. If you have kids and a bike, I highly recommend riding over to Lake View to check out the awesome playground and water park for kids....