Hickory Creek Campground — Hotel in Hickory Creek

I really don't know how this campground gets so many good reviews. Upon checking in, the lady at the gate acted like she'd never checked anyone in before. She asked me 3 times if I'd been here before. I told her no 3 times. She asked what site I wanted. I told her I didn't know since I hadn't been there before but that what I wanted in a campsite was seclusion and shade. Mostly just away from other people. So she picked a site for me. Right across from the bathroom. Very very busy area. (they won't let you drive thru and look first). It took about 15 minutes to get checked in and there was a line of cars behind me trying to return. No second entrance so everyone had to wait while she figured her computer out.

Shortly before dark other campers came in and set up all around me. The people right next to me immediately cranked up country music and proceeded to shout at each other (over the loud music).

My electrical hookups.. Only the 30 amp worked. The 120 did not. A camp host stopped by and told me he had the same problem at his site and showed me how to reset the gfci. But that wasn't the problem. So he told me I should pack my stuff up, drive to the front gate and ask for another site, then go set up somewhere else. ..... I didn't have an hour to fiddle with it as it was getting dark so I just made do. Well, sort of dark. They have BRIGHT lights on all the electrical boxes that can't be shut off, which attract hundreds of bugs. It was awful! Then with the huge street light by the bathroom, my entire campsite was lit up like daylight all night. I got almost no sleep. Now I get that most people travel in travel trailers and fifth wheels and can just close their blinds but if you are in another camping set up consider this. I should have moved sites. There were several that were MUCH better than the one they assigned me (#67).

The restroom was practically unusable. It was so incredibly hot and muggy with no a/c or even a fan going. 2 out of 3 restroom stalls were out of order. The open one had a door that wouldn't close/lock.

My campsite had so much erosion and holes that I had to put items in the holes so I wouldn't stumble into one in the 'dark'. The fire pit was so eroded and unlevel that it was really unusable. The grill was leaning over at about a 45 degree angle making that also unusable.

The noise. WOW. Loudest campground I've ever stayed at. Between the planes, the traffic and the boat noise it was as far as you can get from a 'natural experience'. With that said, I get that this campground is smack dab in the middle of a huge city so I can forgive the noise.

The reason I went with 2 stars instead of 1 is because of the beautiful deer I saw early in the morning. Also because the roads are in good shape, there were covered picnic tables and the lake is beautiful. Not enough to make me want to visit again but at least it wasn't a total loss.

$30 a night is RIDICULOUS!!!!! I've camped in over 200 campgrounds around the country. This one is in the bottom 5%. I...

Service

Cleanliness

The park is right on the lake and has over 130 sites. There is a boat ramp, so you want to be away from boaters. Boaters equal noise and drunkenness in my experience. The sites are asphalt pads. The road is wide and back in was easy. Our site was level, had a fire ring, BBQ grill, patio and nice new picnic table, and view of the lake. There are lots of trees and even though the lake is about 8ft low, it's still nice looking. There is a good amount of space between the sites. Our loop doesn't have ramadas but most of the other sites do. I was all set to give this park a great rating, until I saw the bathrooms. The restroom buildings look nice from the outside, from a distance. They are concrete block, and the outsides are finished with flagstone. But as you get closer you see that all the exposed wood is rotted and has peeling paint. Inside they are worse. Worn and peeling paint, sheets of plywood used to cover up holes cut into the concrete block walls to repair plumbing, overflowing and leaking toilets. Sewage, trash and TP on the floor. Several showers have broken handles and are unusable, and though they have doors all the curtains are gone. Very poorly maintained. My wife refused to use them. I took a shower, the water got just warm, nowhere near hot, but had good enough pressure. Some of the shelves are broken and have exposed wall surfaces in the showers. There is a path that leads to the bathrooms, but it is unmarked, and the asphalt surface is worn and full of potholes. The park was not easy to navigate, with no signs indicating where the exits were. No signs telling you where trails and paths lead. Our site had trash in it on our arrival. There is also visible erosion of sites, walkways, patios and BBQ bases, and no one replenishes the dirt. The immediate neighborhood adjacent to the park is a newer HOA with nice looking homes. But go a couple of blocks and there is blight, bars, tattoo parlors, and extremists. The park is very unsafe, with no police presence or enforcement rangers. The only positive is that we were only 15 minutes to shopping. We went to Petsmart and the...

Please subtract one star from this rating. We showed up on May 25th for a week of camping. The site we had reserved was under water. In particular the power pole was surrounded by at least 4 inches of water. I wasn’t about to wade through the water to hook up my RV. We went on line and the web site showed the lot right next to ours was open. We spent about an hour trying to to modify our reservation. We kept getting an error. The park ranger was driving around and we stopped him and explained our situation. He said “Sorry nothing he could do for me.” We tried to call Recreation.gov. Sorry the call in service is not available said the recording. We went back up to the main gate and talked to the person who checked us in . He said his system showed the site that we were trying to reserve as already booked. Sorry nothing more he could do for us. So there you go. We drive all the way out to Hickory creek excited about a week of vacationing only to end up having to drive back home. When I canceled my reservation I got a message saying that I would get a partial refund. I sent a message requesting a full refund given the circumstance. A week has gone by and I haven’t received any refund nor any correspondence from anyone. Unbelievable! Poor, poor, customer service.

July 2020

It took two months and lots of phone calls to finally get my refund. Terrible service.

January 2021 You would think that these parks would be concerned with the issues customers that have valid complaints. Nope. Not one email or call from anyone associated with this campground. If it was a private campground you know that the management would have responded...