Best Glamping near West Simsbury, CT

For some, the strange people who haunt certain grounds are a plus. For the rest of us, they are just a regular feature of the land west of the great Massassippi River. Anyway, being some of the first people to hit a campground like this one early in the season certainly has it’s benefits. For one, the bathrooms are cleeean as hail, and this place is really well-appointed. Pooping in relative comfort basically makes this glamping. They even have a big ole nice sink to wash your dirty dishes (and whatever other unmentionables, if you nasty), clean water spigots, RV sites with hookups, plenty of wood for sale, forage, or barter, and flat campgrounds with concrete fire pits with built in grill grates and wooden picnic tables. All amenities are within close walking distance, which is also a plus. The trails in October Mountain State Forest are very pretty, with some grand vistas to pull over if you’re some sort of nature pervert or lookie loo. Good fishin’ and mushroom hunting and other things white folks like to do in these parts, too.

Now let’s get to the cons:

bugs- this place, at the end of May is positively swarming with mosquitoes and gnats, even in the 2 rainy and cold-ass nights we spent there, the flies were everpresent. It’s Hitchcockian; and I don’t want to make any accusations or cast aspersions, but these insects are prejudiced, at best.

massholes- these are a given. I’m one so I know.

rangers- because this is a state park, you will have ranger patrols consisting of, um, rangers, some of whom might be more interested in what’s in your coozie than others, because, you know, rules. That said, we had no enforcement issues, but then again the camp ground was empty. Otherwise, unless you’ve got one of the few yurts onthe property, the campsites aren’t far enough apart that you ever really feel secluded. They’re not too bad, though, plenty of room.

This place, overall, is a good time if it’s not below 60 and wet.

Beautiful area to hike. Quiet off the beaten path. There are 3 yurts available May-October (no dogs allowed in the yurts☹️. There are several tent sits available. Dogs are welcomed here! Every site has a fire pit and a picnic table.Highly recommend staying here if you are in the area!

Absolutely beautiful! Highly recommend renting a yurt while staying at October Mnt. Clean and super comfortable

You just can’t go wrong  with a KOA campground. His place in Niantic Connecticut very close to downtown and the beach which they have a shuttle for. The staff is very friendly, courteous and knowledgeable of the area. Plenty activities for adults and kids and they are putting in a new swimming pool which will be up middle of July . They have spaces for 10 sites and up (I would call to see if you can fit if you have a larger rig ) very easy to get to write off I-95 even though you’re close to I-95, I could barely hear the traffic. I heard, crickets and birds before traffic. 

We stayed here out of necessity due to power outage in NW Connecticut for a week. This was the closest location with WiFi and electric that allowed us to work. After we arrived saw on website that health department had sited them for covid violations. I see why. When we arrived there were sign ups for basketball, tennis, and other activities. There was a corn hole and cancer fundraiser competition going on with several hundred campers interacting and no masks in site. The only place I saw any kind of following guidelines was in the office area. Our site was more like camping in a Walmart parking lot with hookups. Golf carts everywhere. A concert and bonfire took place on Saturday night, but did shut down by 11 pm. Not a place we will ever go back to.

We love this campground. It is a small family/dog friendly campground. Large clean pool my kids loved swimming in. Staff is super nice. Small arcade

The location is convenient for the Farmington River and nearby state park but we didn’t have a great camping experience. The staff were all friendly but the campground was very noisy (loud music blasting until 9pm) and the sites were all very close. We tried plugging into the power at the site and the electrical box popped and smoked. We told staff but nothing had been done about it. There was also a very bright campground light near our site in the woods that was less than ideal.

If your looking to party with a group and could care less about being outside, this might be your spot by this was not for me.

We’ve stayed from F-Su. We got a tent spot and it was perfect since it was the furthest one away and there was no one near us which is probably why we loved it so much bc we were so isolated. a little disappointed in the site though, we found broken glass on the walking trail near our tent and by our fire pit which was really dangerous for our dogs. We would visit again though, we loved all the parks and hiking in the area and we left the camp for the day Saturday to hike in the area.

We camped here with a group of friends - about a dozen in all. It was easy to coordinate with the staff to get a few tent sites and a cabin in close distance. Campsites were a bit minimal, and amenities were OK. Overall we were looking for a quiet and clean space and this was excellent for that.

This is a very fun and interesting campsite. However one issue was the garbage situation. Had to walk a long distance to throw out the trash.

Upon arrival, I liked the atmosphere and friendly service but our site was filthy. A bag of dog poop by a tree, trash under the picnic table, cigarette butts littering the rocks around the fire pit, and the pit was so full of ash, there was no more room for firewood. And as other reviewers stated, these sites aren’t the cheapest. I don’t normally complain but this was unacceptable in my opinion. I called the front desk and spoke with a very lovely person. She was mortified and said she’d send maintenance. No. One. Ever. Showed. Up. We waited an hour and then we just started cleaning it up ourselves so we could move on and get started on dinner.

Our site was T3 and it was spacious and spread out from other tent sites. There was a tiny creek meandering behind the site and the woods just went on for miles. We felt grateful to be separated from the RVers and have so much space to ourselves.

Night fell and the place turned into Margaritaville. The seasonal RVers have really taken over the place and while some have tasteful decor and lights, others not so much. Even 50 yards away from the RV section and I felt like I was in a dance club parking lot. The music was so loud. No one seemed to care. Nothing was enforced.

Lastly, there was a lonely port-a-potty across the road from us along with a water spigot. There was trash all around the spigot that remained there throughout our stay (an entire roll of sopping wet toilet paper and an eyelash curler, guys), but the camp sanitation truck came once a day to empty that outhouse, which I never used based on the smell. If you have young kids that nap during the day, this truck would wake them. I walked the extra .2 miles to the bathhouse, which started out immaculate but quickly turned south with the sheer number of people using it. A cleaning log claimed it was tended to but it couldn’t have been true. Trash was endlessly overflowing and soap was running low.

The loud music I could get over for the view but the uncleanliness was just annoying. What a simple thing to fix for your customers.

Also beware of bears. We and several other neighboring campers spied a pretty big black bear not far enough away in the late morning hours. I’m sure they are fed well.

This Campground is smaller and sees a lot of people. There is a small pool that is very busy, and there is a pond for fishing. Great place for family to get together, we used to have family reunions here.

Plenty of amenities. Many types of sites to choose from. The showers could be more convenient. The first site they offered us has a tree growing in the middle of it, which really should be cut down to allow access. The site we moved to was better. However, Saturday night a large overnight party arrived, set up speakers and played loud music for most of the evening. So much for a peaceful camping trip.

I was there with my two sons on a cold, rainy weekend very early in the season - not many other campers. The sites are good size and seemed well laid out. The folks in the office/store were incredibly friendly and helpful. Looking forward to going back later in the season.

Let’s start with what we loved. The Gaga ball pit was great. The pool was nice, although, no seating due to covid. The camp store was convenient and well stocked. the WiFi was really great too. Best we’ve had at a campground!

Now to what wasn’t so great.

We had been Boondocking for a week prior to arriving and needed to dump our tank before pulling into our site. While we were dumping our gray tank, the dump clogged. The staff member told us to just empty what was in our hose on the grass and maintenance would fix it later. Since our tanks were still full, we asked if they’d provide us with the mobile tank service free of charge, but they declined. They did offer 50% off, though.

When we got to our spot, it was covered in hundreds and hundreds of nails and broken glass. Maintenance ended up having to get a shovel to get most of the nails up but we still spent the first few days of our stay picking up nails and glass from every corner of our site.

About three days into our stay, the power line caught on fire and we lost power to our RV for a few hours. Not a huge deal, just one more thing.

Those were the main things that make it hard to give more than three stars, but there was also the small laundry facility (one washer. one drier) , the noise level at night (yelling, loud music at several camp sites around us, a few fights, etc.) and the belligerent drinking on the weekend that made it a not so kid friendly place to be.

Honestly, I wouldn’t even complain about any of that if it wasn’t such a pricey campground. We’ve had much better experiences for a lot less. Just disappointing, but hey. Maybe we just had the perfect storm and none of those things would happen again? No idea. Just seems like the kind of place that’s great as long as nothing goes wrong. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Pic isn’t the best, but it’s the only one I took of site!

We stayed at site 85 in Sunny Crest and liked having some privacy. The sites nearby had some trees providing space between each site. A lot of the sites we drove by were pretty sloped- I would recommend a drive though if you can beforehand.

The picnic table was chained down so there weren’t many options to set up having the fire pit and picnic table where they were.

Hiking trails were nice, good variety of easier and more difficult terrain.