Viking Lake State Park — Attraction in Red Oak

First of all.. Our camp site was very small, too many sites in one small area. Our tent neighbors were so close we could hear them snore. There was only one area for trash, if you were on a walk and had trash there was not a place anywhere on the trails or roadway for you to put it. Movie night was nice.. But my kids and I felt unwelcome because we were not regulars.. We got their early to get a good place to sit, and were asked twice to move so the kids with large blankets could have room. The DNR were not friendly..my 3 kids were fishing ...I threw my sons line out 3 times to show him a better way to cast.. Then went on to continue to take pictures of nature... A DNR officer came down and asked me about a fishing license.. I did not have one, I was not fishing.. He would not let me talk at all about helping my son.. Just kept repeating that every state requires a license.. (I was unaware) I am a single mom trying to show my 13 yr year old how to cast. He acted like he was doing me a favor giving me a ticket for a 3 day license.. a $100.00 fine!!! It could have been more.. He said.. My kids and I waited for 30 min for him to run my run my name! He came back and said. " good news... Your not wanted!" The next day, I felt he was stalking us.. I took my kids to fish again... He parked his truck to watch and make sure I didn't cast a line.. During the movie.. He stood by the hut and kept looking at us. My 16 yr old son who is on the Autism Spectrum and I were walking to a trail.. The DNR guy was driving toward us on the road.. As soon as he saw us.. He turned his truck around... My son was affected by his constant presence.. We were reserved for 4 more days but left early due to feeling like my kids said.. "In prison being watched". We will never return.. I feel that I was singled out BBC because I have tattoos.. And the stigma that tattooed people are criminals... I do NOT have a criminal record at all! But was still harassed, we didn't see him ask anyone else for their fishing license. .. This gave my kids the thought that even if you are not doing anything wrong. You can get in trouble. That is exactly how this went down.. When we were packing up to leave.. The camp host stopped and made a comment about us having a few days left.. And then just sat there for a while watching us pack up.. Why did he feel he had to watch us? Very unpleasant trip.. The clean bathrooms were the only nice thing...

The camp host at Viking lake is working some kind of side hustle. Iowa keeps 20% of there camp sites as walk ins only. We pulled in on a Thursday August 17th around noon, all the walk in sites had a reserve slip on them, not a regular occupied slip but an actual reserve slip, with big letters saying reserve. Now the camp host in site 60 had one of those signs with his name on it, next to him in site 59 a walk up site, there was a reserve slip with the same name as the camp host. He is obviously saving the space for a friend or a side hustle for the following day, a Friday. I asked why all the walk ins had reserve slips and he told me that there were no walk ins. I told him that online and your camp map that is posted claims that this space is a walk in only, he replied, rudely I may add, that they don't have anything to do with the internet and repeated that there were no walk ins only reservations. He is clearly doing his own thing and ignoring allof the Iowa state park rules and regulations. Like I said a posted walk in site had a reserve slip that started the next day, I understand that you can pay and hold walk-ins if you pay every day . The reservation didn't start until the following day, a Friday, many of these other walk-in sites had the same situation, a reservation starting the following day, not following the Iowa state rules. We were told we were SOL, yes all and the family and kids had to camp at a truck stop for the night, unbelievable, I stay at all the Iowa state parks and never seen such disregard to the states rules and...

The park is amazing! We love tha access to the water and it is one of the reasons we couldnt wait to come back! I assure you we are far from the rowdy, drunk, rule breaking group, however the constant reprimands and hovering of the over zealous camp hosts have us rethinking the future trips we have planned here. It is a no wake lake, which is fine, but you would think that would make it safe enough to float around the inlet butting up against our site in life vests. We were quickly told NO swimming was allowed anywhere but the crowded shallow swim beach that you need to drive to. You are also not allowed to ride bikes after sunset, or park a bike on a sidewalk while in the bathroom. Sure these may not seem like deal breakers to some, but once you have enjoyed relaxing at other campgrounds and you feel like all your moves are under a microscope here, it makes it easy to choose a different location for our future trips. Maybe that is the plan though. Perhaps being anal over every move will help run out the ones that you would like to go away so your buddies can camp closer to you instead. Maybe a different camp host is in order, before this beautiful clean park becomes...