Ellacoya State Park — Hotel in Gilford

This was our first and last time visiting this state park, and the reason is simple: blatant racial discrimination. A female guard harassed my group—Asians—for no reason other than the color of our skin. Despite paying for entry and clearly having paddleboards on our car, she wrongly accused us of launching from the beach and violating rules we were never informed of. The man at the gate said nothing about restrictions, directions, or rules. We kept to ourselves, launched far from the beach and swimmers, and still got singled out.

The female guard yelled at us in front of other patrons, drawing unwanted attention and making us feel humiliated. When we tried to explain calmly that this was our first visit and we hadn't seen any signs, she escalated the situation, threatened to call patrol, and accused us of trespassing. She even had the nerve to ask if we had paid—something she didn’t ask anyone else. Why only us?

Later, she came back to record us without consent, further harassing us instead of treating us like paying guests. And when we pointed out other paddleboarders, she claimed she didn’t see them—just us. How convenient. Her behavior was unprofessional, aggressive, and clearly racially motivated. We were treated like criminals simply for existing in a space where we weren’t white.

On our way out, she tried to backpedal and said we were “welcome to come back.” After being yelled at, recorded, and accused of sneaking in? Absolutely not. She made it painfully clear that people of color are not welcome here.

If you’re a person of color, think twice before coming to this park. We came to enjoy the outdoors and left feeling dehumanized and disrespected. Shame on the staff and shame on this park for allowing this kind...

Decent state park, not a lot to offer and could be improved. RV camped here for 3 days July 2017. Nice access to beach, boat launch for kayaks. Campground area is not that aesthetically pleasing but it's functional: Campsites are spacious and level, and sites have electric water and sewer hookups (rare in a state park). Park itself is small and limited in scope: other state parks we have enjoyed have had extensive bike trails, hiking trails backing up to park land. This park is very limited b/c of its size and encroachment of private property on either side. Nowhere for us to bike ride (we drove to a bike trail about 10 min away, but it was only 2 miles each way). Improvements could be made: only one public bathroom and it is badly in need of renovation. Showers are coin operated: for the nearly $50 we pay for an overnight site I would expect a free, clean shower. If they want to limit use by day-travelers, just institute a keycard system into the bathrooms. Individual campsites do not even have their own grills or camp fire rings for cooking out. Playground equipment needs repair and improvement (our kids are older & we didn't use). Not horrible but we will...

I use the park as a RV base camp to explore the area. They have a boat ramp and Beach that I did not utilize. The RV area is slightly unique. All the sites are lined up parallel and close together like in a commercial type KOA environment with very little shade or trees. The park requires you to connect to all three utilities, water electric and Sewer. I suspect because the bathrooms are inadequate to service all the campers if the park was filled to capacity. Showers are available but not free. Bathrooms were very clean but only two stalls per gender explaining the need to connect to all three utilities. It was oddly plain but I enjoyed it because of the quiet and older campers who didn't make a lot of disturbances. I was warned by the park Personnel that a Sturgis type motorcycle rally was happening in the near future and that the park would fill quickly. The park was mostly empty during my stay and I did notice most of the businesses in the area we're gearing up for the motorcycle rally that was coming. Whether or not it was as Rowdy as Sturgis is I do not know but my stay was quiet and uneventful that I...