Crater of Diamonds State Park — Attraction in Murfreesboro

We went here to view the eclipse and to search for diamonds before and after. It was great fun. Not crowded. The park did a great job by limiting the number of tickets sold for that day, making sure the park services weren't overwhelmed. The restrooms and public buildings are neat and clean. The optional equipment rental for digging diamonds offered items such as wagons, shovels, screens, buckets, and other items to make the experience easier. The visitor center has excellent displays . Numerous photographs and items explained the fascinating history of the mine, starting with its purchase (for $1.24 to settle back taxes) as a hog farm and covering diamond discovery, commercial mining attempts, and finally, its status as a state park. Other educational exhibits gave examples of the diamonds and other stones that could be found. They also explained the geological history that produced these unique stones. You are allowed to keep everything that you find and collect. There is a small concession stand that has amazing fried chicken. The portion size was huge. The chicken was just lightly breaded and cooked to perfection and included fries... all for $15. It was so much food that I had enough left after lunch to save for dinner. So it was really two meals for $15. Visitors are allowed to bring their own coolers into the park while mining, but alcohol is prohibited. We had our cooler packed with food, ice, and drinks but chose to purchase the chicken because the aroma wafting over the mining area was just delectable. They also offered burgers, which I'm sure were amazing, but I wasn't about to pass up the opportunity to introduce my daughter to authentic Southern fried chicken. We actually spent two different days at the park. We went the first time two days before the eclipse to scope everything out and get a feel for what we would need or want on Eclipse Day. We knew that we would be in the field all day on Eclipse Day, and we wanted to learn what we needed to know to search for diamonds and (in our particular case) jaspar and peridot. We rented a wagon and sifting screens. We had our own shovels and some small gardening-type tools to more delicate work. The wooden wagons are sturdy and about 30" long, 18" wide and maybe 6" deep. The screens set inside nicely with room for the cooler and some of our other items (camping chair, snall tools, puppy dishes, and water bottles) if we packed carefully. The digging area is regularly plowed into large furrows to renew the surface areas and expose new diamonds. This makes moving across the field with a wagon rather challenging! The furrows are wide, and there are many holes where other searchers dug into the ground to get "fresh" soil to sift through. It's not too bad, though, as everyone is supposed to fill in their own holes before moving to another area or leaving for the day. There are wide dirt paths that mostly skirt the digging area. Basically, we just looked for the easiest way forward into the field and chose a spot near the entrance when we set out. There are two different ways of searching through the soil you dig up. One is sifting the dirt through the duffsize screens right where you're digging. Other opt to use one of the two water stations to rinse their soil, similar to gold panning. There is an excellent instructional video in the visitor center. The park staff are also quite willing to answer questions and will identify any of your treasures if you're not sure what you have unearthed. We spent about 5 hours at the park the first day and 8 on Eclipse Day. The mining hours are 8am-4pm, and you must wash/clean any equipment you rented prior to returning it to collect your deposit. There are other areas outside of the mine and visitor center, but we only briefly visited one (access to the river. And no, to my chagrin, I can't remember the name of the river. But I did find some pretty jaspar!

And yes, we found two tiny diamond chips which we...

While we had a great time as a family, this state park wasn’t our favorite. However, there are some favorable things here. The campsites are not private at all. The good news about this is campers are generally friendly, and we met some wonderful people during our stay.

We stayed at campsite #45. When we arrived at the campsite, we noticed it was assessable. When I asked if we should move because we did not need an assessable site, I was informed it was not currently considered assessable because the bathrooms had been torn down and were under construction. The construction was a problem for us. It was right next to our campsite and many of the construction staff smoked all day long. It is a temporary problem, but it really impacted our stay. The park staff did not indicate there would be construction even though I talked to time twice on the phone before our visit. Because the bathrooms were in the middle of being rebuilt, we had to walk far to the one working bathroom for all of their campsites. The construction also blocked the public entrance to the playground. All hours of the day and night, kids were running through our campsite to the playground. I have kids; I understand. It’s not the kids’ fault. However, the park should have made arrangements for a temporary playground entrance due to construction. Also, when I called the park staff confirmed wifi was available. It was not because of the construction. Again, things the staff should have known when I called to ask. Finally, the water park was not open due to maintenance issues. The staff did not know when it would be open this (2021) year.

Under regular circumstances, this would be a great site for families with small kids, the bathrooms and playground are right there. We could sit at the campsite picnic table and watch the kids on the playground and if the bathroom had been there as indicated on all park material, older elementary aged kids could go unescorted as you can see the entrances from the campsite.

We did check out their walk in campsites. Walk in is a stretch and you are nearly on top of your neighbors. The plus is there are bathrooms right there. You do not have to walk far at all. This would also be a great spot for a family or friends group to reserve all at the same time.

Our trip to the diamond field was fun, but the kids were over it in a couple of hours. Don’t bring a lot of stuff because you have to lug it around. My suggestion is to rent everything to “mine” with at the visitors center. The prices are very reasonable, and they have everything a tourist would need. Bring water for everyone, wide brimmed hat (we had a couple of sunburned necks!), a container for your found treasures, a gardening spade (their shovels are less than desirable) and if you want to bring dirt home, a five gallon bucket per person. We did not bring dirt home. Sifting through the dirt is a laborious process and the chances of “hitting the jackpot” as my 8-year-old says is slim to none and about the same as playing the lottery. Playing the lottery is much easier. 😆

The park also has great paved and unpaved hiking trails. The kids and husband had a great time hiking a mile or so to fish in the river.

All-in-all, I’m glad we went. We didn’t enjoy the construction, and I prefer a little more space between campsites. It was fun to visit a diamond mine in the US, so I think Crater of Diamonds State Park is worth a visit, but just once for the experience of...

4.4 is the current rating at the time of this review.

We stayed 2 nights at their campground, which was good. It was a good time, a fun time digging in the dirt.

Crater of Diamonds: visitor center and souvenir shop, field, campground and swimming pool. All super nice.

The dig: it was quite dry out there, it didn’t appear it had been plowed that day, maybe the other side of the field was plowed though? After scraping the top layers of dirt off the soil looked better, fresher.

The weather: very sunny, around 80 degrees. Bring sunscreen. No bugs so that was a plus.

Treasure: none found unfortunately. The sun does play some tricks on your eyes though. I kept some pieces to wash off later, but still nothing came of those either, just rocks.

Inside the fenced field: there’s a food truck, bathrooms, visitor videos to watch which is optional, water fountain, picnic table areas, hose station.

Equipment: depends on what you want to lug out there. The terrain is hard and rocky and the groves from the plows are deep. I had a beach bag with a couple different hand shovels, a small shovel, sifters, a pill bottle to put small finds in, hand towels, gloves, water bottles and I brought something to sit on, and a wide rimmed hat is a must to keep the sun off you. These items at the least. I forgot my small bucket I wanted to fill with water.

Campground: it was great. I stayed in site #38, which is located in the little loop you see on the campground map. On arrival there was a reserved sign along with my name and some firewood in the pit already. Full hook ups. The site and campground itself is clean and well taken care of. There’s 2 large buildings that house 6 separate actual bathrooms in each building, equipped with toilets, sinks and showers - and they’re spacious enough. There’s also dumpsters to take garbage to as well. There are raccoons who visit at dark, searching for anything left out to their liking. We saw raccoons, deer and frogs. A hummingbird too even and many other birds. Mosquitoes are out and relentless so bring your best protection against them.

Check in for the campground: check in/check out is at 3pm. We arrived after the Visitor Center closed, just continue to your reserved campsite and they’ll call you in the morning. As long as you have a reservation, you’re fine to go to your site after hours. There’s an orange sticker or posting they’ll want to give you to put at your site.

Walking Trail from Campsite to Field: this is a dirt trail in the middle of the woods and is quite the jaunt to walk if you’re carrying digging equipment. It’s not a flat path. It will take you to the visitor center where you have to go to get into the Crater of Diamonds dig site.

I tried to upload more videos, but it appears I can’t, I did take a lot though! I would definitely 💯 come back here to stay and dig. I had a lot...