Paynetown Campground/HOME — Hotel in Bloomington

We made the best of it...

We wanted to take the kids on their first camping trip. We reserved a non-electric camp site for 10 days. It cost $200. I expected a primitive campsite. That's what most people are looking for when they camp non-electric. What I got was a picnic table and grill in the middle of a grassy field with a few trees thrown in. We were close enough to our neighbors to hear casual conversations clearly. The only wildlife to speak of was a few squirrels and birds. We didn't even need to pack up our food at night because there were too many people for the raccoons to exist. Our campsite was advertised as "morning sun". What they meant was there's a tree directly overhead so you get an hour of shade at noon. This camp site is great if you don't actually want to camp in the woods. As for relaxing? Listening to my neighbor fart all night isn't really on my list.

The firewood here is $6 a bundle. It's small and dry we went through a full bundle at every meal. Bring your own.

The camp store doesn't seem to have any set hours. Some nights they close at 8:30 other nights the doors are locked at 8.

The campground and the park aren't associated with each other. It will cost you $7 to get in the first day even with a paid reservation.

We attended a free snake demonstration, the snake was brand new to the park and aggressive. On the other hand, hearing him hiss and rattle at the naturalist was pretty cool.

We wanted to attend an edibles hike. The flyer said "campground playground" at 7:30. We went to the only playground we could see from our campsite, and the only one visible from the entrance to the park. After half an hour, we asked at the camp store and they said it must have been at "the other playground". I'll update when we find out where that is.

Guess I understand why they don't give refunds. It's only Wednesday and we're here...

Camped here this past weekend with mixed thoughts. First, be VERY careful to read the full description of the campsite. If it says the grade is slight & gravel, be ready for a substantial grade that is inappropriate for many campers. And in checking the picture, remember that most sites look level when taken from the front of the site. We had a very bad experience with our site, which was supposed to be a 'slight' grade. We would call it more of a moderate to severe grade. Saw a fairly long trailer near us with the back leveling jack fully extended on top of 2 6x6's, and the tongue nearly touching the ground. If you're in an rv or camper, we would suggest limiting yourselves to the paved sites that say they are level.

Second, the water at the dump station has inadequate water pressure, so it was difficult to actually clean out our tanks.

On the good side, the boat ramp at Paynetown is very wide & not too steep. It easily handled 5-6 boats launching/loading at a time, and there were nice courtesy docks on each side. And the camp store while small is adequate for most people's needs.

All in all, we will probably be back based on location to our home (& our children/grandchildren's homes); however, we will definitely limit which sites we are willing to put...

We have camped here for years but our recent stay was unacceptable. Our site was 130. We arrived to find broken glass everywhere. Online, the site was listed as a “slight grade” but was in fact a severe grade. I spoke with Luke, the assistant manager who tried to tell us that we could’ve parked our trailer in the grass next to the clearly laid out gravel pad which would’ve given us the “slightly graded” lot indicted on the site. Since every other campground we have ever been to requires you to park on the gravel pad, and this exception was not indicated on this site, we wouldn’t have known to do that. There was no site picture either. Given that we were provided with accurate information regarding our site, we wouldn’t have chosen to stay at that particular site. We were given the option to move to a hold site, but after 2 hours between arriving at the site and when Luke spoke with me, we had already unpacked and decided to make the most of the situation. We were comped for one night due to the issues and misleading information. The showers were another issue. No water pressure and the water never got warm. It’s a shame to see how Paynetown has declined over the years. My suggestion would be to camp at Brown County and drive into Paynetown to enjoy...