Tugaloo State Park, Georgia Nov 2020

Park: Tugaloo Website

Campground: 55,590 acre Lake Hartwell. There really are some beautiful views of the lake. Great hills and scenery, if it weren’t for all the campers. Most of the sites were either on a cliff, had a fence blocking the water, or squeezed in so tight, if was hard to tell where one site ended and the next began.

The attendant who checked us in, did not even point us in the right direction. So we had to follow the camp map, for a couple of miles, past 3 cottage areas, the day use area, the pioneer camping 🏕, and several other things like the ranger residence, and try to figure our way around. And hope like hell we didn’t miss a turn, because looking at the roads, there was no turning back.

Amenities: Boat rentals, on site store, boat dock. Multiple Bathhouses that seemed new-ish, or well taken care of. Amphitheater

Privacy : NONE. Absolutely none. I actually did not see a spot that even looked remotely private.

Dump Station: So, we waited about 30 minutes in line for one of 2 dump sites. Of course, the station we ended up with did not have a clean water hose. We have a grey hose, but it also does not have a connector to attach to our flush out connector. We sacrificed a clean water hose, and opened up the back door and flushed through the toilet. I’m sure all the campers behind us thought “omg, they are using a clean water hose, don’t they know that’s bad!” Yes, we know. And apparently, there were ALOT of repeat customers because the guys dumping their honey wagons, were in THE OTHER LINE. At least, they had water, unlike Tomoka. But I still LIKE Tomoka better.

Site specific #67: We were situated in front of the water, at the bottom of a 3 level cliff. Full of campers, and we LITERALLY had to dodge the kids on bikes cliff jumping as we were trying to back in. So much, that we had to STOP and wait for the last kid, to get through and then back up the camper. There are more cars parked in front of us than at home. Maybe these folks live in apartments, but this mess, is not camping. Granted, there are worse sites around, but this one was just so so. We could at least see the water.

Level: Side to side, perfect. We were on a hill so we had to use all of our stabilizer support blocks on the front to get straight and level front to back.

Condition: Clean, crushed gravel (couldn’t stake in the pop up) with a concrete picnic table (that you can’t move). Plenty of room for the 10×10 pop up over the table. We usually like the benefit of moving the picnic table where we want, so with concrete that sucked.

Maneuvering: could have easily smacked the camper, on the OTHER side of the road, trying to squeeze in. The first guy, had slide outs past the water and power supply. The second guy (pictured above, was a little smaller) so he didn’t stick out as bad.

Bonus: It appears that each site has cable hook up. We weren’t prepared for that, and only have about a 6in coax cable so, we didn’t get to check it out. Service was decent enough to watch Netflix without having to download anything. The cell service is lightening fast here. We had a great view of the lake, when the traffic was not in the way.

Cons: No privacy. Tight roads. Site barely fit camper and a pop up canopy. Not a lot of extra space for a tent along side. Cannot move picnic table.

I don’t see us returning here. We really could have just stayed home and had more privacy, a bonfire in the back yard, and had our kids with us.

I’m going to say, Thanksgiving at Tugaloo was an EPIC fail as far as the location goes. Reading online reviews, people seem to love it, but I don’t think it’s the place for us. You can read about the Thanksgiving fiasco here, but once again. I failed to get pictures. I was too busy cooking. But, I did manage to hurt myself while stoking the fire..go figure..