Michigan State Parks vs Michigan County Parks - Muskegon

[louiskathy]

We just spent 7 nights in 3 different Michigan State Parks.
Straits in St. Ignace, Orchard Beach in Manistee and P.J. Hoffmaster in Muskegon. Thumbs up on Straits and Orchard Beach... not so with Hoffmaster.

A 20 minute down pour started Just as we arrived at site #2 at P.J. Hoffmaster. I've never seen so many flooded sites and miserable campers in my life.

Site #2 backs up to the creek and we had a river of 4" deep water going thru our site. It was drained and just squishy in about 30 minutes. Others were not so lucky. Those with tents found out if their sites were "hollowed" or sloped. The only thing level in that loop was the paved road. The park brought out sump pumps to try to pump the water out of the "bowls". There was ONE site in our loop that was graveled, level and above water level. that was site #56. Quite a few sites had standing water over 2" deep in them four hours after the rain stopped. Many campers packed out.

The flies at the beach were persistent nasty little biters.

We decided not to stay a 2nd night... instead we got online and snagged one of the last sites for Friday night at Pioneer Park 20 miles north of Hoffmaster.

Being non-residents we had to buy a rec permit to stay in the state parks. We bought the $31/annual since that was cheaper than going the per day rate for us. I expected to have to purchase a recreational pass to stay in a COUNTY park and was ready to do that when we checked in but got a pleasant surprise. Since we were a truck camper and only staying one night... we didn't have to purchase a $5 sticker. If we stayed longer and "came and went" from the park... then we'd have to purchase one.

Muskegon County Pioneer Park was excellent. So much better than P.J.Hoffmaster State Park.

So consider staying at the county parks in Michigan. They are just as good if not better than the State Parks. Muskegon County park online info and registration

[travelnutz]

louiskathy,

I understand. I sure do not agree with some of the posters on this thread as Hoffmaster is usually an excellent park and CG with 3 very modern and clean bathouses, miles of well marked hiking trails in the forests and dunes on the over 1100 acre park, 2-1/2 miles of superb clean pure sand beach on Lake Michigan, kids love to play in the clean flowing creek, most of the 293 campsites are level and plenty large and you had one of the smallest (site 2) across from the bathouse and the host on that loop, an excellent large 2 story nature center, long constructed wood observation walkways all the way to the beach from the nature center and also to the top of a dune overlook decks for lake and dune views, an extremely family friendly state park, and of course, it's always filled like nearly all the lakeshore state park CG's. So much to do for all ages in these lakeshore state parks!

5 beach miles south of Hoffmaster is Grand Haven State Park and it gets over 2 million visitors every year and is only 48 acres. 20 miles south of GHSP is Holland State Park which gets around 1.7 million visitors each year. Then there's the very popular huge Ludington State Park. Heck, there's over 100 State Parks in Michigan and most all of them are on the water! Must be some real good reasons these lakeshore state parks etc have so many visitors each year and year after year for over 90 years now! Yes, you need reservations very early at most of the lakeshore state parks all summer long as they are that popular and are sold out very quick in January, right after New Years. Includes Hoffmaster as it's usually full too. BTW, Grand Haven local area has 12 CG's with 8 of them on the big lake or the Grand River and most are also full in summer. Depends on what type of CG an RV'er wants.

Not putting down Pioneer Park but it's a very different kind of CG and Park and is much smaller, less than 1/8th the size of Hoffmaster, and is quite flat compared.

I'm sorry that you just happened to be at Hoffmaster when a very freak storm hit and dumped so much rain. So far from normal! The ANNUAL total precipitation along the Lake Michigan side of the state is only 29"-30" and it for 12 months and it of course includes the winter snow so you can see how strange and abnormal the rain fall was at Hoffmaster.

[louiskathy]

travelnutz wrote:
louiskathy,

A heavy rain along the lakeshore like you'd experienced is very UN-common and flooding at Hoffmaster SP CG very rarely happens as it's all beach sand soil and usually drains real fast. Biting flies along the lakeshore is NOT common at all and only occurs when an approaching storm from the west pulls the air on the east side towards the storm to feed it.

The flies feed like crazy before an approaching storm as they have to hide under things so they are not hit by the falling raindrops and they don't know how long the storm/rain will last. It's normal anywhere and explained very well on several web sites.

It sure was a real cloud burst of a long lasting narrow storm and Hoffmaster was dead center. We live only approx 8 air miles south of Hoffmaster on the lakeshore (south side of Grand Haven) and have for our 74 years now and know the weather cycles very well. The interesting thing about the storm you experienced is that at our home, we only got a few sprinkles out of the storm and barely got the road wet and Pioneer Park area (about 10 air miles north of Hoffmaster) only got a medium to light rain too. It was on the TV news at night.

Glad you enjoyed Pioneer Park. We have camped at both Hoffmaster and Pioneer many dozens of times over the years (52 years of RV'ing) as it's close enough for family weekend get together weekend camping and the kids and grandkids are working and they can commute quick if they have to work on a Saturday etc and still camp with the family.

I enjoyed reading your info on that storm.

I'm not judging State parks against County parks... I just wanted RV's to consider going to a county park as an alternative.

I planned our trip in stages. This trip we left Oregon May 8th and we'll go back sometime in October. Planning for overnight stays in Michigan has been the most challenging. Probably because we're here at the height of the season and everything is full.

[garmp]

OK. We're planning a trip from St Louis to Sault Ste Marie the second week of Sept and want to stay along the lake at as many sites as possible on our way. We are B campers requiring only electric, flush toilets and hopefully showers. We hope to camp along the coast to the UP, bum around for a day or two and then onto Canada and their Provincial Parks for a 'yeah, we stayed there' before heading toward Farnkenmuth, MI for a rally.
What are the better "camp" grounds along the coast? (and or the UP) Rather not have a treeless field with tables, but want the conveniences of electric and flushers?
Sorry if I hijacked this thread.

[avan]

I agree with 2 gypsies. I try for county and city parks as my first option. And having been at both PJ (once) and Pioneer (3-4 times), I also rate Pioneer, as a park, much higher than PJ.

[2gypsies1]

We found that county parks throughout the country are very nice...city parks, too.

[kknowlton]

I remember digging trenches to drain our campsite at Higgins Lake SP years ago, after a downpour. We hadn't noticed when we chose it, that our site was the lowest in the whole CG. 😞 We had inadequate tools - used a large serving spoon and a pan to do the digging & to bail out the firepit! Quite the adventure. I can laugh at it now.

[is_it_friday_ye]

Please don't judge all of our state parks from Hoffmaster. It's not our favorite park either. We have many other great ones.

[travelnutz]

louiskathy,

A heavy rain along the lakeshore like you'd experienced is very UN-common and flooding at Hoffmaster SP CG very rarely happens as it's all beach sand soil and usually drains real fast. Biting flies along the lakeshore is NOT common at all and only occurs when an approaching storm from the west pulls the air on the east side towards the storm to feed it.

The flies feed like crazy before an approaching storm as they have to hide under things so they are not hit by the falling raindrops and they don't know how long the storm/rain will last. It's normal anywhere and explained very well on several web sites.

It sure was a real cloud burst of a long lasting narrow storm and Hoffmaster was dead center. We live only approx 8 air miles south of Hoffmaster on the lakeshore (south side of Grand Haven) and have for our 74 years now and know the weather cycles very well. The interesting thing about the storm you experienced is that at our home, we only got a few sprinkles out of the storm and barely got the road wet and Pioneer Park area (about 10 air miles north of Hoffmaster) only got a medium to light rain too. It was on the TV news at night.

Glad you enjoyed Pioneer Park. We have camped at both Hoffmaster and Pioneer many dozens of times over the years (52 years of RV'ing) as it's close enough for family weekend get together weekend camping and the kids and grandkids are working and they can commute quick if they have to work on a Saturday etc and still camp with the family.

[the_silverback]

I agree on Pioneer Park, great place. I have lived in Michigan 70 plus years and RVing since 1970. I highly recommend you check out the private RV parks in MI. Less money better sites!!!