Honeysuckle Hollow — Chain O' Lakes State Park

We stayed in Honeysuckle Hollow for a night. Not many people were there that night, as it thunder stormed. However site was well kept and concession stand available by the boat dock with everything you might need.

It’s a really nice site, but the running water bathrooms were not cleaned regularly and the pit toilets were almost overflowing on a Thursday. The site was also filled with garbage when we arrived.

Large sites with plenty of room to spread out. Plenty of birds and other wildlife for the kids to see. No alcohol is allowed so it made for a great family weekend. Short walk to bathhouse. Pit toilet for emergencies.

*** reviewing as a baby/toddler camp family on the go :-) we chose the loop 11 was on because it was close to the path to the playgrounds and lakes plus bathrooms… avoid the first 2 sites from either end as the ones closest to the main loop aren’t very deep. Closer to the center of this row is best.

Pros- easy pull in sites and lots of walk-in availability. Sites are almost all flat thankfully, so no weird slopes to sleep on and easy for babies/toddlers to stay safe. Also seemed pretty respectful in the evenings with people toning down the noise.

Lots of electric sites, deep enough for 2 tents, 2 cars (although close to neighbors and no trees between sites), picnic table and fire pit.

Bathroom shower houses were decent (we usually just have toddler use her travel potty, but this one was fine).

Multiple playgrounds, access to launch sites for kayaks, little store to buy ice cream or snacks.

Cons - SO many ticks. With a baby crawling that needed to be set free, we were constantly doing checks. Luckily our screen house pop up on a tarp that was sprayed ahead for tick repellent plus a blanket on top of that did the trick, but they literally fall out of the trees into people! Plan for toddlers and babies to have a contained covered screen house and have them wear hats or a wagon shade on walks so nothing lands in their hair.

Also - the raccoons at night here are no joke. The second it’s dusky, they come scavenging for absolutely anything food has touched. So basically, eat dinner and do s’mores early, then everything must be packed into cars for the night and all surfaces wiped down.

We stayed here for a week over the summer in 2021. We had a back-in site on the north side of the campground. We had 50 amp, but no water/sewer, although there was a water spigot next to our site that we could use to fill up jugs of water. The dump station was near the entrance to the camping loop and had potable water. It was also very busy and we had to wait when filling up and again when dumping. The campground was really busy during the weekend, but cleared out Sunday and we nearly had the whole loop to ourselves during the week. The park has many trails, which were nice.

Staff are very friendly, sites are well maintained and most of them are spread apart.

Checked in Friday afternoon. Things were busy in the office, but the staff was friendly and apologetic about the wait. Campsite is nice, we're pretty close to our neighbors but not as bad as other places I've been. Walking distance to a fishing dock! The camp store by the boat launch has fire wood, live bait, food, and other supplies.

These sites share an electric box.  Some spaces the box is further than 30 feet from the pad.  A lot of the spaces are also crowded together.  Recommend sites 23 to 46 for spacing and electric distance.  We originally booked 96 but could not extend our slide because of large trees on either side of the pad and then the electric was about 50 feet away. Moved  to 50 one of the nicest spots.  Staff is friendly and bathrooms were clean. There are a large amount of  trails to hike and you can walk to Turner Lake from the Honeysuckle Hollow campground.   There is not a lot of grass around the campsites and lots of places have over grown weeds.   DO NOT FORGET your bug spray the files are huge.  The upside of lots of bugs are lots of bird watching.  Many pretty varieties.  We did  not encounter any COVID restrictions, bath and shower house and camp store were all open.

The sites are more open and closer together than I care for but the park is nice

We were camping here right in the middle of fall. The leaves were changing and our site was near the lake. Awesome family friendly spot. Adult beverages must be in a solo cup. Good for RV and tent camping. The bathroom isn’t too far of a walk from any site.

Very impressed with this state park! It was huge, almost 3 miles just to our site! The showers were clean. The spots were large and wooded with nice fire ring set ups. The staff was very helpful answering any questions and giving recommendations. We stayed on a primitive/wilderness site for $12 with no electric. They will allow anyone on these sites-we even saw huge RV'S and 5th wheels on primitive sites.

There are amazing trails through park for people to hike, bike, or ride horse on.

Spring Grove is a tiny town nearby with a little corner bar called “The Grove”. They serve amazing food with great service. Very clean! I recommend checking it out if you’re looking for some good food.

Electric site 7/5-7/7. Campground gets quiet at night. So many campground hosts around I don’t think they would let it be loud past quiet hours. First night the concession closed early so weren’t able to get firewood and had to go to the closest gas station. We could not figure out the problem but I’ve never had such a hard time keeping a fire lit with the wood from the concessions and gas station. Did some fishing, just caught some bluegill. We walked around a lot and did some kayaking. Shower houses were pretty gross in tent loops. We still had a great weekend.

This is a great campground. The bathroom facilities have a bit to be desired but still very functional. If you like to kayak or canoe this is a great place to be. There is a water way fee per kayak or canoe per year but it is well worth it. The camp sites are spaced apart at a good distance to lend you some privacy. We love coming here every year.

This is our go-to state park when I need to get out of Chicago for the afternoon. We camped here once as a starter trip with our two kids, since it was easy enough to go home if it all went south.

Non-electric sites in the loop on the small fishing pond were relatively quiet, well shaded, with decent screening between sites. Easy walk to bath house adjacent the electric sites, which were jammed with RVs.

Nice easy hiking/biking trails. Boat rentals. Stocked concesion building.

Our kids, 4&8, really like it here. Nothing too hard or scary for my little city kiddos.