Cloudland Canyon State Park GA

We found another great park - and a great deal! Cloudland Canyon State Park is on Lookout Mountain in the very North West corner of Georgia. The sites are large, mostly level with gravel. You get water and electric for $30.00. There is a dump station near each campground (East Rim and West Rim) and quite a few grey water drains sprinkled throughout the campground to dump wash water OR your grey water tanks. If you like being tucked away in the trees, this is for you. This park has more amenities including shower houses, laundry, picnic shelters, disc golf course, hiking trails, biking trails, camp store with great prices, and activities. This weekend alone they have a craft fair, hay rides with campfire after and a free astronomy program. We are close to Chattanooga and the Chickamauga battlefield. I will try to post pics tomorrow after we check out more of the park.

Now for the deal - we found this online and you can see what you get for membership and join there but due to our gypsy life (no way to get mail quickly), we had to sign up at the camp office when we checked in - the woman there was incredibly helpful. We joined the Friends of Georgia State Parks. Family Membership is $75.00 BUT I am a vet so it was $56.00. Membership is good for one year. We got two free nights of camping ($60 savings right there), 10% off any additional camping we do in that year, free day use of all GA run parks and historic sites (most seem to have a $5.00 parking fee that we won't have to pay) PLUS free admission to a several GA Historic sites that we were going to pay to go into anyhow. We also get 10% on purchases at the camp store except food and something else I can't remember. This particular store has great prices on awesome hammocks that I've had my eye on for years and we got an extra 10% off that price. John and I will be happily swinging from the trees from here on out.

Side note: Hammocks are dangerous. You lie down in them and the world just drifts away.

Looks like a great park, and a great deal on the membership.  (Noting both in our ever expanding logbook)

Hammocks sound like a perfect solution for me.  Cooper is usually always found where I want to relax next (his sister Lina is more respectful). With a hammock, he'd have a heckuva time figuring out how to climb in it, and if he ever did his little paws couldn't quite navigate a mesh!  I'm already daydreaming!  ;-)

It sounds like you guys are really enjoying your trip, even with the occasional bump in the road.  We are looking forward to even getting on the road!

- Mike

Ah Mike, you have furry friends. They can be useful with a hammock. We stayed at a place once that had hammocks for guests and the resort dog liked to come rub against you asking for skritches... thereby helping you sway when you were too mellowed out to put your foot down and do it yourself. Train those puppies!

If you go shopping for hammocks, we bought the ENO hammocks and the special straps that secure them VERY quickly and easily to trees. Each is rated to 400 pounds. The hammock has a carabiner that clips onto loops spaced out on that strap. You are lounging within minutes. They scrunch all down into a little bag for storage. The ranger said if we have an overhead branch, we can hang the two ends together and have a lounge chair. Pretty cool. John is thinking about sleeping in one if we get a nice night with no rain forecast. 

I know the wait is hard for the Phoenix but once you have it... away you go.

What a deal! Thanks for the info. Post pics when you get a chance. Let's hope they have the same deal in 2015. 2014 is our New England trip (home)

Judi

The promised pics. We camped on the west rim. The campsite pics are taken from the driveway of the next site on either side. Some are much closer but the west rim sites are nicely wooded and spread out. The east rim is more open and closer together but also right next to the overlook and interpretive center.

Wow

The Georgia State Park deal gets better! They have a program for an RV camping club where you get this brochure and each night you stay in a state park you get a sticker on your brochure (each paid night, freebies don't count). When you have nine stickers, you get the tenth night free. You can save them up and cash in multiple nights at a time. I also saw on the state website a snowbird special where, if you book in and pay for a full month between Nov 1 and Feb 28, you pay half price for the site. They list the parks it is good at. Since the rates seem to be 28-30 a night, that puts you at 14-15 with the special. The sites have water and electric and a few have cable. We may never leave Georgia.

For you golfers, they have some golf specials also.