Best Tent Camping near Wickes, AR
Searching for a tent campsite near Wickes? The Dyrt helps you find campsites near Wickes with tent camping. Search nearby tent campgrounds or find top-rated spots from other campers.
Searching for a tent campsite near Wickes? The Dyrt helps you find campsites near Wickes with tent camping. Search nearby tent campgrounds or find top-rated spots from other campers.
Nestled in the forested splendor of the rugged Ouachita Mountains, this recreation area is located in the southern portion of the national forest. Visitors are invited to hike the nature trail or experience the excitement of a canoe trip on the Little Missouri River.
Day use/swimming only.
Beavers Bend State Park is located in the mountainous region of southeast Oklahoma along the shores of Broken Bow Lake and the Mountain Fork River. Guests traveling down the winding roads through the forests of pine and hardwood trees will find adventure, beautiful scenery and plenty of activities inside this state park. The scenic beauty of Beavers Bend State Park makes it one of Oklahoma's most popular areas. Nestled among the trees and alongside the Mountain Fork River are rustic and modern cabins, RV sites and tent campsites, as well as two group camps. Two yurts named "Happy Hearth" and "Bear Tracks" are also available for overnight lodging. These round, tent-like structures are located right near the Mountain Fork River. This 3,482-acre park offers 47 cabins with kitchenettes, plus 393 campsites and over 50 tent sites spread over eight camping areas. All RV and tent sites are available for online reservations. Waste dump stations are available. Leashed pets are welcome in the park and there are cabins with one and two bedrooms that allow pets for a small nightly fee.
If you are one of those folks who prefers a different, more rugged camp experience, primitive camping is allowed almost anywhere in the Ouachita National Forest unless there is a sign stating otherwise, or it is a wildlife food plot. Located throughout the Forests are areas that have been campsites for many years. These are located along roadsides, trails, mountain tops, or near streams. Camping at dispersed locations have additional responsibilities: "Leave No Trace" so others can have a similar backcountry experience, pack out any trash or litter, scatter campfire ash around so it doesn't pile up, and leave the area better than you found it. Please filter water before drinking! Beware of stream crossings after heavy rains. Please read the Dispersed Camping guidelines before heading out.
APRIL 2020 - Closed temporarily due to storm damage Small campground with Adirondack-type shelters in a remote mountain setting on a small scenic stream. It provides a good site for a base camp for hikers in the Caney Creek Wilderness.
Beavers Bend State Park is located in the mountainous region of southeast Oklahoma along the shores of Broken Bow Lake and the Mountain Fork River. Guests traveling down the winding roads through the forests of pine and hardwood trees will find adventure, beautiful scenery and plenty of activities inside this state park. The scenic beauty of Beavers Bend State Park makes it one of Oklahoma's most popular areas. Nestled among the trees and alongside the Mountain Fork River are rustic and modern cabins, RV sites and tent campsites, as well as two group camps. Two yurts named "Happy Hearth" and "Bear Tracks" are also available for overnight lodging. These round, tent-like structures are located right near the Mountain Fork River. This 3,482-acre park offers 47 cabins with kitchenettes, plus 393 campsites and over 50 tent sites spread over eight camping areas. All RV and tent sites are available for online reservations. Waste dump stations are available. Leashed pets are welcome in the park and there are cabins with one and two bedrooms that allow pets for a small nightly fee.
We decided to stay here for an overnight after being in Hot Springs area.
There was only one other camper.
The fee is $14 a night, not the $12 listed on sign. There is a pay kiosk that takes cards
The campground was very clean and had many many trash cans.
Bathrooms clean and had running water and flush toilets.
Cell signal was poor with Verizon. Found an opening and Starlink worked great.
This park is a wooded area beside a lake. Campsites have a picnic table & grill. No electricity or water. No concrete parking pads. However almost all sites have a view of the lake. Beautiful views. Two pit toilets were clean & smelled ok.
This site was difficult to find. It is listed on the highway with a sign but on GPS it wasn't listed. The proper address is 4101 US-70, Kirby, AR 71950.
You book through recreation.gov but it is actually listed under Self Creek campgrounds. When booking just lok for sites listed on LOOP JW.
This is a good site for tents, campervans, and smaller rvs. There are sites for larger rvs but not many. It may be difficult to find a level spot if you're in a larger vehicle. There is only one site directly on the water. The remainder are on the wooded hill but still have a beautiful view of the lake.
The bathhouse has flush toilets and showers but is very old. They maintain it well and it is cleaned regularly. The toilets are perfectly fine but the showers are just old and a bit icky. I would suggest for showers going to the Daisy State Park. They have newer and nicer showers.
We found this on a whim but were pleasantly surprised. Great little campground. Picnic tables and fire rings are dated at best but functional. The view was phenomenal!
The GPS coordinates are wrong for this one but I couldn't locate the correct site. Tookus down a gravel road that wasn't bad until it turned to mud.
Large campground with lots of different areas to camp. They have sites in the woods, next to the water, and out in the open.
The bathrooms were clean and well maintained.
Amazingly beautiful and cheap. Bathrooms are vault toilets. They smell bad but the room is clean.
They have a lot of campgrounds but most are very close. Not a bad thing for those social butterflies but a little tighter than I like. Their bathrooms and showers are really nice. Clean and spacious.
It's definitely worth a visit but make sure to book well in advance. They sell out quick.
The price here is now $10 per day but if you have America the Beautiful Pass it's half price.
Couple downsides are that the bathrooms are pit style bathrooms and kind of nasty and unless you snag one of the sites far back in the woods you are pretty close to the highway so some noise.
It is my understanding that they are scheduled to update the bathrooms in the next year or two but until then I'd definitely suggest going to Arrowhead Point. It's right down the road, same price, quieter, and nicer bathrooms.
This location is right on the lake with quite a few camp sites available. The only down side is they have only one site available with electric and hookups. Everything else had no electric or hookups.
The electric site is $22 and all the rest are $10. If you have a senior pass they are half off though. It's first come first serve.
A nice boat ramp is on site as well as a swimming beach. The beach isn't really big and I visited in October so not sure how nice it is or deep but still a good option to have.
The bathroom has flush toilets and are decently clean. No showers but the state park right down the road has showers you can use for free.
Overall, I really like this place. It's quiet and peaceful. And most important, doesn't hurt my pocketbook too bad.
My first impressions of this site were terrible. The Bathrooms are extremely old and honestly seem like they're rotting down. The playground area is small but jot terrible. The area for rvs is pretty cramped with no privacy. Luckily while talking to some folks there they directed us on down the road. There are two more sections specifically for primitive camping that are really nice. There are a couple picnic tables and fire rings. There is also a nice pond. The cell signal isn't terrible but it's a bit hit and miss for internet.
Overall, I would suggest it but don't expect to use their showers or bathroom. Go a couple minutes down the road and use the state parks showerhouse. It's really nice.
I never start a review like this, but this park had the cleanest bath house/restrooms I've ever experienced! 2 stalls in the shower in this loop and they each had a clean shower curtain, a bench, hooks to hang stuff. Immaculate. Better than some hotels!
Stayed in site 104 in the loop by the boat ramp. Nice shade and long parking pad. Sense of privacy. The sites that back to the cove had terraced areas, so if stairs aren't good for you then skip, but the arrangement made for a large area to spread out relax. This site had an additional parking pad next to it that was right next to the tent pad. Handy for ent campers to unload or boaters for boat, plus there were extra parking spots in the cul-de-sac leading down to the boat ramp.
The lake is sometimes smooth as glass. Kayaks for rent and this is a must do. Visitor center was being remodeled at the time of visit. 2 short hiking trails. Great state park!
Really enjoyed the Acorn campground - south end of park. There are many to choose from in this large state park, but I would return here. Site was level with the usual amenities all in working order and not too close to neighbors. The river ran directly behind the site and I was entertained by an otter family and ducks daily. There is a water release siren that sounds occasionally and it is loud, but it doesn't happen frequently, or at night, at least not during my stay.
Enjoyed the hiking in this park. Lots of great cleared trails. Often times I was the only hiker. A real gem is the COE access road that runs along the river past the spillway. If you walk far enough down you can view the real "wild" river with the islands of cypress trees and boulders creating eddies and the relaxing sounds of the river spilling over and around. 10 out of 10 stars
No Verizon service except at the nature center (definitely worth a visit especially if you have kiddos, and the ranger here is fantastic!!). You can jump on their wifi, or if I walked to the pavilion behind the store I could get one bar on my phone. Note off season store hours in photo. Not much in the store. The BBQ at the Lookout restaurant is the draw.
This spot I found already had a man built fire ring made from rocks. Small peaceful pond and is right off the Deadman South Trail.
We stayed at AD10. It was a back in spot with an extremely high break over angle. The spot itself was fairly level but getting in and out is a pain. I recommend AD12 which is almost a direct back in from the road. The campground itself is very nice, but it is very winding with all the trees and spots slotted together. If you get a spot in the front near the road, there is a lot of through traffic for people going to or leaving the lakeside. The back of the campground was much quieter near the pull through sites. The dump site was directly across the street from the campground but you have to go down the road and either make a tight left turn or go further down and turn around. Bathrooms were not too far away, they were private, clean and AC. Not a lot of street lights throughout the campground made things nice and quiet at night. The site had okay Verizon cell service, around 10-20 mbps. The T-mobile service was much better around 50-60 mbps. Lots of activities to do around the park, there is the lake, plenty of hiking trails. The parking pass situation can get a little confusing at other areas of the park, but basically if you register your vehicle plate when you make the reservation, you are all set for your stay. It's a quick drive to Hochatown where there are things to do but depending on when you go it can be extremely busy. Broken Bow itself was about a 30 minute drive depending on traffic and there were more things to do, eat, and see. The traffic going back and forth between Hochatown and Broken Bow is quite busy and almost makes you not want to go anywhere. It causes a pain point when trying to get from the Stephens Gap area of the park to the main area of Beavers Bend, where you have to leave, hit 3 lights, wait 30 minutes, just to go 5 miles.Overall it’s a good campground but I might recommend staying at the other area of the park just for convenience sake, getting in and getting out.
I keep coming back here to dig for diamonds. There are cheaper campgrounds in the area, but the State Park grounds are top notch. Very level camper pads, stable power and water and everything is well maintained. There are multiple bath “houses” — single shower room style privacy, not a large room with curtains. A playground in the sites for kids to play on also.
The only downsides that come to mind are the iffy WiFi (the reservation system is pretty accurate on which sites have “good” WiFi and which do not) that is decent for casual web browsing but not likely to be streaming possible. And then a mixed pro/com is that satellite connections (direct or Starlink) is going to be rough due to the wooded aspect of the sites — although the trees do help keep the camper cooler. 🤷🏻♂️
This is a quiet campground with plenty of shaded and nearly perfectly level pull ins. Power is consistent. Water pressure fluctuates from good to high — regulator necessary. Wifi is spotty, but the reservation center is pretty accurate on strength of WiFi at various sites. The site we are in right now, WiFi is sketchy.
In cool weather, a walk to the diamond field would be fine. In hot weather, no way.
Stopped in for a couple of nights. Power and water with a great view of the lake. Staff were wonderful and helpful. Would stay again if ever in the area.
With so many trails that you can access just by walking out of the camp site. This is my favorite spot to camp in Oklahoma
Had a very relaxing time with the family here. The campsite is very clean and the lake is beautiful. All of the staff are great!! Only negative thing was the bathrooms. Heater looked to be on and it was pretty hot inside.
We drove slowly back and forth along the road exactly where the coordinates lead us to but there is no vehicle access to the forest there. It’s completely overgrown
The river and creek merging was so beautiful! It was a beautiful drive there. But whoever was there before me trashed it out. It’s sad.
This was on my wifes bucket list, didnt find any diamonds, got dirty but had fun and got dirty. Sites and bath house were nice , full hook ups
Beautiful and lush and QUIET. I love it. Asphalt and gravel sites. Clean bathrooms. Water and electric only. Gorgeous 3 mile hike around the lake. I hear it’s a fishing lake but we don’t fish. Enjoyed the scenery and peace. Would come again and again. Don’t forget the ice, there’s nothing close. Site 33 looks to be my fav.
This camp is ideally located in the Crater of Diamonds State Park with easy access to the Visitors Center by foot or car. The campsites are well maintained and adequately situated to afford some privacy. There are 6 individual bathrooms with toilet, sink and shower, in the bathouse nearest to us that are modern and clean. The shower was "almost" hot.
The only negative is that the adjacent site's fire ring is too close to our back window and the smoke from a fire could enter our window.
This is our second stay at this park and we would definitely return.
We stayed in Daisy for the Eclipse weekend and expected this place to be crawling with people, so we were so happy to see it was still amazingly clean and quiet. We stayed in walk-in site #67, which was at the very end of the paved path from the parking lot. The site had a very level and massive gravel tent pad, as well as firepit, picnic table and lantern post. The hill in/out is quite steep, but the pavement makes it easy to haul with wagon, and I've rarely seen multiple water spigots in a walk-in area like that. Our neighbors were a little closer than we're used to for walk-ins, but we had glorious views of the lake and very little traffic walking past our site, which is a blessing when you have two somewhat barky dogs. The camp store sold firewood, ice and souvenirs and they were super-friendly, and one of the rangers even helped load the firewood in the car for me. My only complaint is that there's only one hiking trail in the park, and it's just a very short nature trail and doesn't really give you a good view of the lake or anything. However, there were many beautiful trails to be had within a 30-40 minute drive of the park.
We went for the 4/8/24 eclipse and really liked this campground. $20 for water, electricity and trash can at every site. According to neighbor, this is usually low use, but it was fully booked for the eclipse. The only downsides were flies and small bathrooms. (2 stalls) But running water and a small shower.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which is the most popular tent campsite near Wickes, AR?
According to TheDyrt.com, the most popular tent campground near Wickes, AR is Cossatot Falls Campsites — Cossatot River State Park - Natural Area with a 5-star rating from 12 reviews.
What is the best site to find tent camping near Wickes, AR?
TheDyrt.com has all 29 tent camping locations near Wickes, AR, with real photos and reviews from campers.