First off I want to say we had a blast. It was so nice to get away from reality…no cartoons, ipad games, Disney movies, work emails, phone calls and so on. We went to Cuvier River State park about 45 minutes North West of St. Louis. The campsite itself has about 50 full hook up sites and a handful of electric sites and the majority are basic. With the exception of the full hookup sites, most sites are well shaded and spread apart. Our site #001 was literally right next to the playground…obviously this was a big hit with Sam. It was also very well shaded and set back a ways from the neighboring sites. The only negative was that the trees were so close….Deploying the awing was not possible.
One of the biggest things I realized….it’s a lot of work. It rained early Sunday morning and due to the current drought while it was welcome it was a huge mess. The dirt had become a fine powder making the otherwise friendly earth into a slip and slide of fine slurry. Everything that was outside became so dirty that it was banned from the inside of the camper and thrown in the back of the truck for cleaning at a later date. Sam did great during the set up and tear down. This was the time that I was most concerned about… how I would get it done without him melting down. I left him strapped into his seat (Truck running and A/C on of course) and he didn’t make a peep.
I have become a big fan of the Missouri state park system. Every park we have visited has been very nice and well kept. There are some things that you do need to account for at most of the parks….very few of them have full hookups so water conservation is key. The website www.mostateparks.com is very nice and easy to navigate. They even show photos of the actual camp site to get a better feel for what you are after.
All in all we had a great time and I look forward to the next trip.
