Detroit Lake State Recreation Area — Attraction in Oregon

TRAILER/RV CAMPERS BEWARE!! Took my family on a camping trip to Detroit Campground, last weekend Sept 22-24th 2023. As soon as we plugged our power cord to our camp trailer into their electric hook up, it smoked, sparked & caught fire in a matter of seconds. It was already an eventful day because we had to take one of our family members to the ER for a collapsed lung- so we didn't get to the campground until late that night. Then, this electrical fire happens to top off the night!!! Poor kids & us had no electricity (which means no heat, no lights, no cooking). Next day we called stores, they said they had the cord but didn't actually have the right one after all. We had made 2 trips back to Salem looking for a new cord for our trailer. Which we found that no one carried that style plug. The maintenance guy Simon who works at the campground changed out a burnt ground wire & burnt receptacle. Why change those two things out- if they weren't bad??? 🤔 Simon said we should file a claim for reimbursement on the trailer cord. What's interesting is no one was helpful getting us the info for filing a claim until the last park ranger I believe his name was Greg. He said to call & ask for Robert Ray. Shout out to park host Brian he was awesome. He was trying to help us. That guy We didn't catch the other lady's name that was next to him but we think that was his wife that was also trying to help us. Those two people were awesome.

We called the Detroit Campground on Monday to talk to Robert Ray about the trouble we had but instead got some lady. She said she'd call us back but instead they had Simon call us a few days later to tell us they will not reimburse us or give us another stay (on them). We didn't even get to enjoy our weekend. I paid for full hook up, not a tent site. We froze our buns off. Remember, it's colder in the mountains & Fall weather. At this point, I'm not sure we'll be back. We didn't even get to enjoy our family trip because we were taking time by driving back & forth to Salem, because they had faulty electrical!!!

Buy a surge protector!! We did because after this experience, we're not taking...

My wife, our two dogs and I stayed here in the 'H' loop for 4 days/3 nights at the end of May 2023. What a beautiful campground! Our site was H50, a lakeside site. Check in was a breeze and the staff was very friendly. I had made online reservations and preregistration done online as well, and their paperwork was all in line with mine.

When we arrived to our site, it was spotless and raked, and even had some leftover wood in the fire pit. To our left was a public access paved trail down to the lake, which was separated from our site by about 10 feet of shrubs/trees, and down a slope so any traffic would not have been an intrusion. We had our own dirt lake access trail as well, and from what I could see walking the intersecting trail below, all sites had their own private access trail. We had water & power supply, and a sink waste water disposal drain on our site. To our right was another site, that was about 15 yards away. Actually, as we drove around the next day, touring the entire campground, most all the sites were spacious and had a high level of privacy between them! I must have seen about 6 different park rangers maintaining the campground during our stay; all the trails, lake shores, boat launches and bathrooms were very clean. The bathrooms had a very pleasant cucumber soap smell to them, were well stocked and had private stalls. My wife was very pleased with the bathroom/shower situation! It was very quiet, although pretty empty at the time of our stay - but with so much space and foliage providing privacy, I dont think it would be bad even at 100% occupancy. There are noise curfew signs posted at the entrance to each loop. The lake itself was warm enough for me to swim in most of the afternoon, and the swim area was well-marked with a highly visible colored plastic balloon rope. Its where my wife learned how to use her new iSUP!

I refuse to even touch my cell while on vacation, so I dont have any pics/vids, but just trust me - you wont be disappointed!

Bundle of wood - $6 Bugs - very minimal, saw only 2 or 3 mosquitoes @dusk Lots of friendly ducks and birds, and 1 really...

As a food enthusiast and nature enthusiast I cant be more enthusiastic than I am about this campground. I have cooked many things, I am a 4 diamond chef and I’vee been watching the food network my whole life. I mean seriously I even DVR all the shows and I will delete Castlerock in order to make sure I have all the shows about food recorded. I also was born in the woods so I know nature. I once witnessed a women making eggs in the same place I poop in (the bathroom) and I think that shows the variety of culinary experiences that can occur. Some people might not like to cook, but everyone uses the restroom, this campground is a great place for foodies to interact with the common folk and for the culinary community to expand their reach. Seriously, I’ve never seen a place life this. Also, as someone who loves to interact with animals and insects, there are a million bees and wasps and other insects and I also saw a fish and I like to use the scents of the animals in my life and in my cooking and also that fish I saw I caught and cooked in the bathroom and I ate it with my family and I really enjoyed it. For $40 a night to camp and $5 per extra car after 1 car I would recommend this campground 100%, I will be taking my family for...