Look Rock Campground — Hotel in Maryville

The good: After being closed for nine years this campground has just been reopened on October 15 after a $4.5+ million upgrade. Practically everything is new including the roads, parking areas, utilities including electrical and water, picnic benches, tent gravel pads and even the bathrooms have been redone. This was and is our favorite campground in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park as it is not as crowded an normally has less noise than other campgrounds. (Not counting road noise. See below.)

Nice scenic overlooks on the Foothills Parkway.

Multiple water outlets & trash bins in the campground.

We have Verizon and depending where you are in the campground we got 1 bar to 4 bar LTE service. At Look Rock the weather station tower which has wonderful views and is a short walk from the campground we got a full 5 bar service. Most any provider should be full service from that location. I am pretty confident that for this campground you can wait to get there to see what spot you want and then make a reservation on the Recreation.gov app. We did and had no issue although in the lower spots of 37-70 it may take a while.

Out of all the camping spots there are 10 that have electrical and water hook ups for you RV and camper people.

A lot of people miss the lighted large wash sinks between the male and female restrooms.

The bad: As this is next to the Foothills Parkway there are at times some vehicle noise especially loud racing motorcycles.

Spots 23-26 are right next to a house that somebody built right next to the campground. Ruins the camping feeling so avoid those spots.

There are no showers.

The campground is a loop so there was a good amount of vehicles coming through with people looking around. That should lessen over time as it was on all the local news outlets about the reopening so most were locals looking at the redone campground.

This campground is a little bit away from the tourist sites of Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge and Seveirville. To us that is great but to others maybe not. You are near the small community of Townsend though which bills itself as "The Peaceful Side Of...

This campground is a hidden gem. It is on the "quiet" side of the Smokies, so it is a little farther from some of the park's main attractions. You can hear the motorcycles on the nearby road at times. This did not bother us, but I know it bothers some. It's a bit tricky to get level. The campground was redone and reopened a couple years ago. There are three bathrooms here (no showers) which are very nice. The Look Rock Campground has 70 sites. The sites are basically arranged in a loop. Most sites are primitive. There are ten sites with both electric and water hookups. There are tent sites, RV sites, and sites for either. The campground has water and a dump station available. It is a pretty campground. In one area, you can see a home right behind the campsite. Not a big deal to us, but it does bother some.

If you are coming to Look Rock campground, you'll want to pay attention to the directions. The campground is close to what is known as "The Tail of the Dragon" which is an eleven mile very curvy road. If you're pulling a camper or have a large motorhome, you'll want to avoid this way. Don't take US 129 or the Happy Valley Road.

We came in via the Foothills Parkway - which had several turnoffs for scenic overviews. GPS will route you through the "Tail", so we added Walland as another destination (before Look Rock Campground), but we didn't go there. Putting in Walland forced GPS to go farther east (for us) and thus travel to the Look Rock Campground via the Foothills Parkway.

There is a cell tower in the campground, so we had no problem using our TravlFI to get internet. The Look Rock tower is nearby and provides...

This campground is a hidden gem. It is on the "quiet" side of the Smokies, so it is a little farther from some of the park's main attractions. You can hear the motorcycles on the nearby road at times. This did not bother us, but I know it bothers some. It's a bit tricky to get level.|The campground was redone and reopened a couple years ago. There are three bathrooms here (no showers) which are very nice.|The Look Rock Campground has 70 sites. The sites are basically arranged in a loop. Most sites are primitive. There are ten sites with both electric and water hookups. There are tent sites, RV sites, and sites for either. The campground has water and a dump station available. It is a pretty campground. In one area, you can see a home right behind the campsite. Not a big deal to us, but it does bother some.||If you are coming to Look Rock campground, you'll want to pay attention to the directions. The campground is close to what is known as "The Tail of the Dragon" which is an eleven mile very curvy road. If you're pulling a camper or have a large motorhome, you'll want to avoid this way. Don't take US 129 or the Happy Valley Road.||We came in via the Foothills Parkway - which had several turnoffs for scenic overviews. GPS will route you through the "Tail", so we added Walland as another destination (before Look Rock Campground), but we didn't go there. Putting in Walland forced GPS to go farther east (for us) and thus travel to the Look Rock Campground via the Foothills Parkway.||There is a cell tower in the campground, so we had no problem using our TravlFI to get internet. The Look Rock tower is nearby and provides...