SW Virginia Campoground

thanks everyone for your great ideas....

USAFBILL wrote:
Breaks Interstate Park is a great place to hang out.

It is a great place, but it's about 80 miles north of the TN border and that's 80 miles of winding mountainous roads.

Dave2001 wrote:
Try Natural Tunnel State Park between Duffield, VA and Clinchport, VA. It is about 24 miles northwest of Kingsport,TN.
If I remember corretly the road from Kingsport to the road for the campground is four lane highway, even thru the developed areas.
The campground has an old and new section. We stayed in the new section. Sites are decent size, bath house is new with a laundry. The sites have electricity and water.

Natural Tunnel is located just off of Rt 23, which changes into I-26 at the TN line, at the 17.3 mile marker, then you have about 1 mile until the entrance of the park. It is just north of Kingsport, TN. I don't know which border you want to be close to because Virginia runs along about 150 miles of TN's border. If you could give us a little more information, it might help to pinpoint something.

The "new" section is Lover's Leap Campground and has 30 and 50 amp, a new bath house with individual shower rooms along the back, laundry facility and a large stainless steel double sink outside for your large pots, etc. Each of the sites are long - usually about 50'-75' in length and will accommodate even the longest/largest RVs. The sites are pea gravel and gravel. There are limited trees ON the site, but the sites are fairly private and do have views of the trees and surrounding forests.

The "old" section is Cove View campground and has 20 and 30 amp only. All the sites are pull-thru and although they may be listed to accommodate a 40' RV, there are trees and turns in the road that limit that to about 30' unless you wait for everyone else to leave the campground so you can use their sites to get turned around. There is an old, but clean, bath house in this campground and you can use the laundry facilities in the other one.

There is WIFI at the camp store that is pretty good, there is a large pool with diving boards, waterslides and a lunch counter within the park. There are lots of activities during the summer months, both during the day and at evenings.

We camp host at the campground a couple of months each summer, so we are very familiar with it.

We've stayed at Natural Tunnel State Park and Jessie Lea in Big Stone Gap. Both are wonderful campgrounds. Natural Tunnel is a gorgeous state park with electric/water hook ups and the sites in the Lover's Leap section are large. The road leading to the campground out of Kingsport, TN rt23 is 4 lanes and a good drive. Natural Tunnel is closer to the Tennessee state line than Jessie Lea. Natural Tunnel has lots of trails for hiking, a chairlift that takes you to the base of the tunnel, or you can hike down to it and a large pool with slides and diving boards that my kids enjoyed. Jessie Lea had its good points too, it was located on a nice creek, the sites were electric/water/sewer, the bathrooms were the cleanest we've ever experienced. Jessie Lea had the friendliest owner and there was this great porch area outside of the office with picnic tables and rocking chairs for hanging out. I would highly recommend either of these.

Try Natural Tunnel State Park between Duffield, VA and Clinchport, VA. It is about 24 miles northwest of Kingsport,TN.
If I remember corretly the road from Kingsport to the road for the campground is four lane highway, even thru the developed areas.
The campground has an old and new section. We stayed in the new section. Sites are decent size, bath house is new with a laundry. The sites have electricity and water.

Hungry mother is nice,like rob said several around bristol if you want to get away from it all grayson highlands state park,grindstone campground are both very nice creek side campground is another that comes to mind it's right in damascus va.You didn't say when you were planning your trip if it's around either race at bristol everything will be booked.

Jessie Lea is a good private CG near Big Stone Gap. Also near the Natural Tunnel, SW Virginia.

Hungry Mother is off I-81 -- FHU. Nice Park and lake/trails to hike.