Camping at Stillwater State Park

Last week, we spent three nights at nearby Stillwater State Park on Lake Groton.

Stillwater State Park has 62 campsites, 17 lean-to shelters, a beach and boat launch.

We don’t do a lot of camping in Vermont, figuring that we already live in the woods, but it’s nice to visit a few of the parks mid-week when the campgrounds aren’t quite as crazy.

The park entrance landscaping is typical of the lovely displays throughout the campground.

We brought our kayaks, my bike, and our birding gear.  We also found some “summer reading” mystery books at the “take one, leave one” collection at the visitor center.

We were at site 43, probably our favorite.

The area has some interesting geological features — many of them being these massive boulders – glacial erratics – which were lugged here by glacial ice.

This boulder was at the side of our campsite. Penny is putting up with me but ready to get down.

Vermont parks have no services per se and most of their sites are for tents, pop-up campers, or lean-tos so there are few sites for large RVs and not that many for our mid-sized 25 footer.  There is no cell signal for many miles but a decent wifi connection at the office.

Many families spend a week or two at the park, often reserving the same site year after year.  There are an amazing collection of tents, tarps, and lean-tos and more than not, several generations camping together.  It’s good to see kids out on their bikes or just framming around in the park – and they seem to get tired and go to bed early.

The birding was ok for late July although we missed hearing the song of the Veery which we heard last time we were there.  I did hear and see a Canada Warbler as well as some Nashville Warblers, Yellow-rumped Warblers, Blackburnian and Chestnut-sided Warblers.

We took the short hike up to Owl’s Head and enjoyed some pretty views. The water behind Mary is Kettle Pond.

One of the objectives of the trip was to test the new adjustable weight distribution trailer hitch.  Our original hitch was carrying the trailer nose too high and so, after four winter trips, I decided to get a new one.  After a lot of messing around and replacement parts, I got it hitched up and it worked great.

We read a lot, paddled a bit, hiked some, and went to bed early.  It was a wonderful stay at a pretty well-run state park.  And it was only an hour’s drive home.