Shenandoah in July: Why Big Meadows Won Us Over (8/16/2026)

We decided to go camping in Shenandoah National Park for a few days during the last week of July. We booked a spot at the Big Meadows Campground and headed off with our new Airstream World Traveler. I am happy to report that we had a blast – an absolutely wonderful time. The campground is huge with 221 camp sites, and it was mostly full, but it never felt crowded. It is just down from the Big Meadows Lodge. The temperatures were at least 10 degrees cooler than in the lowlands. It was in the mid-70s (22 degrees C) during the day and low 60s at night. It is off-grid, but we never missed the electricity that would be needed to run the air conditioner.

After arrival we spent two full days there. Friday evening was very busy, but that’s understandable, the park being so close to Washington, DC. We left on Saturday, so I have no idea what that looked like during the rest of the weekend.

We did three hikes: one up the highest peak in the park (Hawksbill Peak – 4051 feet), the other around the lodge on the Appalachian Trail, and the final one to the visitor center and back from our campsite (the Story of Forest Trail). On the first evening we walked on the main trail though Big Meadows. We left our dogs in the camper during the Big Meadows walk and Story of Forest Trail walk. The temperatures were sufficiently cool, so we were not afraid of them overheating.

On Friday evening we decided to treat ourselves to dinner at the lodge. Cooking in the Airstream is easy enough and usually very good, but it was nice to go on a date. My wife ordered smoked chicken and I had the trout. Both meals were good; the chicken was so generous that it came back home with us and was enjoyed a second time. I washed my trout down with a Big Meadows IPA, specially brewed for the lodge. For dessert we had blackberry ice cream enjoyed on the deck while watching the sun set. We were visited by a Chinese lantern fly, a pest that is slowly invading the eastern U.S.A. and wreaking havoc on the natural ecosystems.

Our overall opinion is that we need to return. It was delightful. This was our third camping trip in the Blue Ridge, this one in the National Park and the other two were along the Parkway in Virginia: the Peaks of Otter and Rocky Knob Campgrounds. While they were all off-grid, and we liked all three, Big Meadows was our favorite. The other two are tied for second.

Over the past three years we have camped quite a bit and if you are a regular reader, you must have noticed that we do not often stay in National Parks. The reason for this is that National Parks often do not allow dogs, and we always travel with our two beasts. The only other one we stayed in was Big Bend National Park which we absolutely love. But even there, no dogs allowed on the trails.

It is such a shame what the current administration is doing in Big Bend National Park. They are bulldozing a perimeter road and there is talk of constructing the famous border wall, completely screwing up the ecosystem. And this is an area with the lowest number of illegal crossings. It would take days of wandering in the desert to get somewhere.

It is not the case that we avoid U.S. Government camp sites. We love U.S. Army Corps of Engineers sites. In fact, one of our favorite sites was the East Totten Trail Campground (and <here>) in North Dakota.

Wow, although we are no longer camping rookies, we are still Airstream newbies and learning a lot. Where will our next trip go to?

Sunset on the Big Meadows

Big Meadows

Our site at the campgound

Below the Lodge

Hawksbill Peak

Virginia Campgrounds (8/4/2026)

I have spent some time in state parks and campgrounds in Virginia and surrounding states. I wrote about it a long time ago <here>. That was 2016 and I think that it is time to update this after 10 years. It includes a couple of additional state parks that we visited and a few that I forgot in the initial post.

1. Hungry Mother – This park has great cabins and great hiking. We stayed there in a cabin one time and camped there once. The camping was done during the partial solar eclipse of 2024. We enjoyed both stays, camping was good. Restrooms were clean and well maintained. This is one of my favorite parks
2. Grayson Highlands – We camped there twice once more than 10 years ago in a tent and once in our Transit. It takes some driving to get there; it is remote. It felt Alpine and yes if you like to hike it is great. It is a day hike from Mount Rogers the highest peak in Virginia. It is also on the Appalachian Trail. In the tent we were visited by the wild ponies, while at the slightly lower campground we spotted a bear. Restrooms are clean and well maintained.
3. New River Trail – A great (mountain) bike and walking trail that I visit a lot. Just look in my label list for Draper and you will find lots of entries ranging from the descriptive to the philosophical.
4. Shot Tower – On the New River Trail, just interesting to visit.
5. Claytor Lake – I visited this one for one or two hours for a hike and to look around. If you have a bass boat and like fishing, this one is for you. They have nice looking modern cabins. This one is not for us; we like hiking and biking.
6. Douthat – Another very favorite state park. We have been here twice, and stayed in log cabins that were built in the 1930s, or camp. Great trails for hiking. We absolutely love the place. I have multiple short entries and photos in my blog on this park; just look at the labels.
7. Shenandoah River – Another great park. Stayed here three times, twice in spring and once in late summer. We enjoyed it tremendously. We combined nature hiking with visiting some of the wonderful wineries in this area.
8. Sky Meadows – When we visited, this was only a hiking park with access to the Appalachian Trail, and I am not sure if this has changed. We had a great afternoon hike on the trail. I went solo another time.
9. Westmoreland – Nice park, along the Potomac River, near some nice wineries, Washington’s birthplace, and general Lee’s home. In other words there is a lot to do and a lot of history and culture to be had. On the beach you can even find geologic shark teeth. We stayed in a cabin three times and camped once. We had a lot of fun during all visits.
10. Belle Isle – A very new park; it is very flat and good for walking. We visited twice, once for a hike and we camped the other time. Make sure you have tick protection during the hikes.
11. York River – This is our home state park. It has great hiking, kayaking, canoeing, mountain biking, and riding trails. No camping or cabins. We enjoy going there and walking through the marshes and we kayaked there as well.
12. Kiptopeke – Looks great. We just drove through it to the shore to look at the concrete ships that were sunk as breakwaters just off the shore.
13. First Landing – A great park with great hiking trails. Cabins are really nice here. We stayed there once.
14. False Cape – We spent a day in March walking from Virginia Beach to North Carolina and back. It was all along the beach, looking at wild horses and shore birds.
15. Chippokes Plantation – Another “home state park”, although I’ve only been their once for the annual peanut festival. It looks nice for the rest, and we really need to rent one of the cabins one of these days.
16. Pocahontas – We go there for retreats of our church, and DCR had their annual personnel award ceremony there. It is great hiking, biking and kayaking/canoeing.
17. Holiday Lake – I was there once for a conference. It was nice. Not much else to say about it. It was far removed from everywhere.
18. High Bridge – This is another bike trail. I did this a number of times and started in Farmville. I have a number of blog entries on this park as well.
19. Twin Lakes – Interesting, this is an historic black state park. The cabin we stayed in was right at the lake and was really nice. It is more a recreational park. Hiking was fair and not well developed. We visited right after a storm and there were a lot of trees down. The story is that camping in a trailer or RV might be interesting, access is difficult.
20. Occoneechee – This is a park on a lake near North Carolina (Kerr Lake). You can guess that this is a park for people who have a bass boat and fish. It is a new park with great cabins but not many trails. We enjoyed our stay, but should have brought the kayaks instead of the mountain bikes. I actually wrote about it <here> in my blog.
21. James River – One of our favorites. It is a dark sky park. We rented a cabin twice. But we visited the camping areas and they looked good. This place has some wonderful hikes. It is very remote, bring everything you need.
22. Machicomoco – This park is 20 minutes from our home. It is brand new and developed to celebrate Pocahontas and Native Americans who lived in this general area. We go there at times to go hiking. It has a camping area which looks nice but very exposed and has little shade.
23. Caledon – We visited this park once for a hike. It is on the Potomac near Fredericksburg. The hike that we did was great.
24. Natural Tunnel – This is probably the most remote park (at least from where we live). It is almost at the point where Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky meet. We were camping there and loved it so much that we asked to stay another two days. The hiking is magnificent. One minor issue were the stink bugs that we picked up.
25. Clinch River – Located in SW Virginia, I visited the area (St. Paul) and went on a day hike one morning after visiting the region for work. This is a protected river watershed and at the time of my visit there were some trails but no amenities yet.
26. Bear Creek Lake – Another park in fairly remote central Virginia. Good hiking, a nice lake for fishing and swimming. We stayed in a cabin which was good, very much like all the other modern cabins in the park system. Friends of ours stayed there but were not enthralled by this park. At the time of our stay, it was important that it was relatively close to Richmond (about an hour and a half).
27. Fairy Stone – Another remote park, known for its famous fairy stones. We tent camped here once. It is a nice park with some great hikes. We never found a fairy stone but did find an arrowhead. Like with James River State Park, I would bring in everything. It is a drive to the store, but then again, the store is near the fairy stone area, which is actually not located on the state park.

Wow, this is quite the list. Virginia has 44 state parks, and we visited 27 of them. We stayed or camped (sometimes both) in 13 of them; we just hiked or visited the other 14. Feel free to add your likes, dislikes and additional campgrounds below in the comment section.

Next time I'll post some more details on non-state park campgrounds in Virginia.

A little bit of a teaser.  Recently we camped in the Shenandoah National Park.  This photograph was taken there, but more about that in a future post.