Best Equestrian Camping near Laurel, DE

I spent 5 days 4 nights on the shore of Assateague. As an equestrian this was a once in a lifetime adventure. Feral chincoteague ponies everywhere you look! Both towns of chincoteague and assatesgue lean into the horse craze, they have equestrian stores, riding barns, and horse museums just about everywhere you look. During the summer there is an annual “pony swim” where the wild ponies are rounded up and swam from one island to another so they can be sold. I cannot speak from experience but from what I learned from locals this event brings in over 50,000 people. You will need to plan around this if you wish to avoid crowds, although this location seems to be heavily populated all year round, don’t let that discourage you.

Side note- the crabbing is amazing among the local marshes!

Beautiful scenery, love the wild horses. Just be careful opening the door, I've been greeted by a few horses!

Great being able to take your horse and ride the beach. Great camping, riding, fishing or just walking the beach and there is wildlife of all kind. The wild horses are all over the island and have on occasion come into the campsite. Weather can be really really cold or really nice in November. (personal horses only allowed to camp on the island from Oct to April 14.) Great place to visit.

Great spot for a secluded and quiet experience. I have seen horses everytime I have camped here. We always go during the winter or early spring months to avoid the bugs as they are awful during the spring and summer. Do not feed or pet the horses!

It was a 5/5 star experience. When I got onto the beach, I thought it was pretty but as I looked around, I saw the most majestic creatures ever, the wild horses roaming the sandy beach. It was an experience I would never forget. I would recommend it to horse lovers.

The island is beautiful and the horses are cool to see. It's a bit sad how the horses aren't really wild and more come to humans for food. The wind was the only issue, we couldn't leave the tent without it blowing away in the wind. Definitely would return and maybe make a trip out of it.

Horses will roam right into campsite.

Camping on the beach with wild horses

This campsite is like no other I’ve ever been to. If you don’t mind wild horses joining you for dinner and trekking around your campsite at night, then this is your place!! The beach is absolutely gorgeous and so is the scenery. If a crowded beach is not your thing, it gets less crowded as you walk away from the boardwalk. Please be kind to the horses and if you see an injured one, let the Park Rangers know immediately.

No hookups but wow the views! And if course the wild horses are amazing.

Beautiful national seashore.. beautiful beach. Biting flies, biting gnats, biting mosquitos. You will get eaten alive! Watch for the horses. May is mating season.

The beach was beautiful, and you can camp roughly 100 yards from it. Many campsites available, and you can actually see the horses

We camped in the walk-in sites toward the end (south side) of the ocean side sites. You park along side the road and walk on a boardwalk to your site. Depending on site, you will have to walk on sand to get there as well. Bring a beach wagon!

Toilets are vault and showers are cold water beach showers (not full closure- open on the bottom) which would be fine in the summer but were a bit chilly when we went on a cool few days in April.

No dish washing station- to be expected- but we witnessed a few pple washing dishes under the water source and dumping there - making for a large puddle of gross water- not cool.

Some sites are on the beach, and you can position your tent to be on the dune looking at the water- some are inland a bit more but still a very short walk to the beach. Some you camp on sand (obviously) some of the inland sites have intermittent grass. I’ve heard bugs are bad in warmer months (naturally)- no mosquitos when we were there in April.

We drove through the bay side camp sites and these looked great too- the calm-watered bay side looked nice for wading & playing for small kids. There is some shade here vs none in ocean side. It’s a short walk or drive to the ocean.

BRING STAKES FOR SAND AND GUY YOUR TENT. I witnessed many collapsed tents while I was there. One sun shade that flew away.

Wild horses = piles of horse poop everywhere. Wasn’t a problem, just walk around them. Keep snacks in a locked cooler. The horses came for my 3 yo who was eating snacks while loading up the car. They aren’t messing around!

We saw many horses on ocean side & bay side. Watch out for a brown pony named Chip. The rangers & volunteers were very friendly & great at keeping tabs on the horses.

The beach shack store across from the ranger station near the entrance offered a surprisingly large selection of items.

Crazy mosquitoes in the summer. As the deal with any national seashore in the summer. Sand in the toes, wild horses on the beach. Amazing!

Chemical toilets, no electricity. Wild horses are everywhere. Put food and toiletries in car. Beautiful beach on both bayside and Oceanside. Awesome kayak rentals.

There are two sides. Bay and Ocean I reserved a drive in ocean front site just over the dunes. No showers, just toilets. The horses do run through the camp and on the beach so be sure to lock up your coolers. Some people in the site across from me had some uninvited guests while grilling. The horse fly bites are painful. Mosquitoes as usual-annoying. Invest in good repellents. Windy. Had to use guy lines on tent to keep from blowing over. I went in June and it was hot even with the ocean breeze. Dogs are allowed on the beach and in campsites but not on the trails. Don’t forget fly repellent for them!

This place is beautiful plus there are the most amazing wild horses and sand dunes. We love to camp here but it gets very windy at times. Will keep going over and over!

Many people do not realize there is a wide array of wildlife on Assateague because everyone is so obsessed with the horses. Specifically the birding on Assateague is phenomenal. Oceanside camping is very neat, but it fills up fast. The sites are close to bathrooms (I believe the national side has pit latrines). There are also showers, albeit cold. The sites are a decent size but be advised, they are completely sandy. You WILL get sand everywhere and it is unavoidable. Expect it so it does not put a dent in how wonderful the trip will be. The Oceanside sites are a dune away from the beach. Use the walkways to gain access to the beach as the dunes are protected and you will get fined for taking a shortcut. As many of the reviews advise, there are mosquitos. A lot of them. There are also biting horse flies. However catch the island on a breezy day and the breeze takes care of them. One of the best parts about Assateague is all of the activities you can do. There are bike paths, kayak rentals on the bayside, bay fishing, ocean fishing, crabbing, etc. The worst part about Assateague are all of the tourists who stop in the middle of the road to view the horses, blocking traffic and causing back ups.

For hardcore campers!! I accidentally booked the bayside campsite vs the seaside campsite and we had a very tough time. We have been camping here on and off for the past 10 years on the Seaside and it is one of my favorite beach camp sites but stay away from the bayside campsite on the bayside.

The biggest problem for us was there was absolutely no breeze or wind on the bayside, The camping spots are in a wooded area so you do get plenty of shade but the trees block any wind blowing in from the ocean. No breeze or wind means dealing with tons of flying biting insects...constantly. And I mean lots and lots of horse flies.

And for some reason I think the wild horses are more active and more aggressive on the bayside vs when camping on the beach, just my personal experience. Our camp was raided every every night and day, even when we had horse proofed all our food and our campsite. I ended up storing all our food in our tents inside lockable bins.

Most of the people I saw camping on the bayside had RV, which is the only way I would come back to the bayside.

Read my other review for seaside assategue camping for some helpful tips.

Last family trip of the year and it didn’t disappoint. We stayed in site D25 again just as we did 2 yrs ago. It’s a pull through site as are all sites in loop D. This is pet friendly and has electric and water. Dump station is across from loop D. There are 5 loops with Loop E being tent and cabins/hurts only. That Loop also has island tent sites. We couldn’t walk into that area. Each loop or area has its own bathhouse which appear to all be individual family style bathrooms.

The layout of the sites in loop D is not typical. All sites in this loop are pull through and parallel to the road, so the left drivers side of your camper faces the road and the right side faces your camp area. If you stay in an inside loop site you will be facing the camper on the other side of the loop. For instance D11 and D14 face each other. The distance between sites across the loop isn’t huge or blocked by any foliage but didn’t seem to be an issue for our friends who stayed in D24. If you stay on the outside of the loop you will either face the woods (higher numbered sites) or loop C through the trees ( lower numbered sites). Our site is pretty level as are most sites. This is Delaware which is flat land.

The one issue with most every site are the trees. Most every site has a tree to watch out for. Other loops are all back in sites and many of those have trees to keep an eye on as well. This is a shaded campground. At the end of each loop is a pier on the pond which is large and beautiful. There are playgrounds in each loop and bike rentals at the camp store.

The tent area is walk in but they provide wheelbarrows or carts to haul your stuff. These sites are very private and well spaced off the walk-in path and from each other. The cabins and yurts are also walk-in but again you have the use of carts. Some of the cabins are facing the pond and offer gorgeous views.

There is a primitive group camp area complete with bathhouse, screened in pavilion, open air pavilion, numerous picnic tables, horseshoe and volleyball courts and sits at the point so the views of the pond are plentiful.

There is a disc golf course within walking distance and the weekend we were there a competition was happening. There is a day use area with boat rentals and lots of trails for hikers or horses to use.

The town of Laurel nearby has a few stores. I found This and That Country Store which was so cute. The owner was super nice. The beach areas of Delaware are not too far away if you want a beach day.

This has become one of our favorite campgrounds in DE.

This place is such a cool park. The beach is great, although definitely be wary of the mosquitoes. Especially at night.

The wild horses are really what people come for, and they are definitely worth the visit!

I was really looking forward to this trip. We stayed on the Bayside of the campground. Our site was close to the bathhouse, which was modest with cold water and vault toilets. Fresh water pump was nearby, as well.

Based on the reviews, I was expecting a beach camp out with the ambience of wild horses running along the shore. Sand between our toes. Fire cooked meals. Idyllic... Sadly, that’s not at all what we got.

We arrived late to meet some friends before setting up camp. We were supposed to have dinner with the them. But dinner was delayed — VERY delayed — because of horses. A small herd of them (around 8) decided to hangout in our campsite waiting for their meal. This meant we couldn’t get ours. As soon as any food would come into ‘nose-shot,’ they would start advancing on us. We waited over an hour for them to lose interest and move on to the next site. We went through this for every meal. It became a real hassle.

It’s obvious other campers have not been so responsible with their food in this area. The standard is to hide all food as soon as you see the horses. This mean storing anything with a scent in your closed vehicle or in the “horse box” under the picnic table. With the way they would wait for us to pull food out, it was very apparent other campers allowed them to have a free-for-all previously. And no amount of noise shooed them off. If anything, it made them more aggressive and we had to watch them closely.

A little while later, we finally settled in and set up camp after having our “dinner” in the confines of our car. Dinner was snacks since we couldn’t cook anything. Placing anything on the fire or stove was like a beacon to the horses.

The next problem we encountered was the mosquitoes — they were everywhere and in hoards. No matter how hard you tried, there’s no keeping them out of the tent. We left a day later covered in bumps, most from throughout the night.

One good thing was the cooler temps meant no horseflies. On a previous beach trip, we were swarmed and covered in bites within minutes of exiting our car. Be prepared because bug spray does very little.

Let’s also not forget the “stickers” — little burr-like plant pods that are all on the ground and stuck to anything and everything, especially skin. These stung bad.

Once settled in for the night, we dealt with the wind flapping the tent pretty wildly at times, horses neighing almost constantly and coming awfully close, and two raccoons fighting on the edge of our tent. A restful night was not in the cards there.

The only good thing was the location. We were a short walk away from the beach. The kids and I at least enjoyed that part.

I was beyond disappointed and cancelled my upcoming trip for the following month as soon as I got home. I don’t know if the experience was different Oceanside, but i will never be staying Bayside again.

Love staying here. beautiful sunsets you can see right from your tent and walking on the beach at night is amazing. Clean facilities. Horses can get in your stuff so make sure to put it away in your car

As other reviewers have mentioned, this campground has more vegetation than its Seaside counterpart. This does lend itself to less of a breeze and more flying insects than you might find on the beach, which makes it a perfect spot in the colder fall and winter months. We stayed here when the low was around 17 degrees so we appreciated the natural protection.

We did have several interactions with one wild horse who did not seem to be bothered by us or our dog. The dog on the other hand was certainly bothered! Between the horse and the sand spurs in his feet he would probably rate this spot a lot lower.

While I wouldn't recommend staying here in the warmer and buggier months, it is a nice alternative in the should seasons when more protection may be warranted.

Adventurous, in that you'll get a first-hand glimpse of the horses, as they are aggressive! Very nice Visitors Center where you could request a ranger badge for the little ones. Would recommend visiting in late summer, early fall to avoid the crowds.

Quite windy but with sand/snow stakes and sand bags/mounds our tent was secure! Lovely beach and views. No bugs at this time of year. Definitely secure your food or put it in the car as the horses come around every morning.

It’s beautiful here, horses are cool, beach is great, but the bugs stink! Bring some deet it’s the only thing that works! No electric and generators are only allowed until a certain time at night. We’ve been twice so I guess you could say we liked it :)