Little Bennett Campground

We recently stayed the weekend here in loop A. 

There are several good things that can be said about this campground. 

Restricted- only people camping and visitors are allowed to use the facilities. Keeps things from being too crowded. 

Good sized sites- My family of 4 was able to stretch out 2 tents, our 4 camping chairs, the provided picnic table, our car, and have plenty of room left over. 

Limited activities on weekends- jumping pad/pillow, pedal carts, laser tag ($), ceramics ($), t-shirts ($), hikes, and more. Changes weekly. Details sent out at the beginning of the week. 

Decent stocked camp store with reasonable prices. $10 for wood, 3.50 for 7 lbs of ice, $5 shakes, and lots more. 

There are some clear downsides, too. 

Only 1 bathhouse per loop. Pay attention to where your site is located. You might be in for quite a hike to go to the bathroom, which is inconvenient in the early morning hours. Loop E doesn't have a bathhouse (mostly reserved for RVs). The bathhouses have showers and somewhat warm water. 

The tent pad is gravel. While this might help with drainage (I don't know), it makes it incredibly difficult to walk on and stake down your tent. 

The camp store/activities are quite a good distance from some of the loops. It took me about 10 minutes to walk at a decent pace from the start of loop A to the camp store. From our site which was only not even close to the halfway point it would have added another 5 minutes. The spots really deep in would have easily been a 30 minute walk each way. So driving, especially with little kids, is unfortunately necessary in some instances, especially if you want to visit the playground/basketball/volleyball courts which are WAY down past loop E. 

Activities are limited to certain times. When we arrived Friday the jumping pad was only open for an hour from 4 30 to 5 30. We arrived just before 4 30, so we unpacked a few things and took the kids to the jumping pad area (right next to loop A). It wasn't open and inflated until almost 4 50. You'd think because it was opened late they would keep it open later. Nope! Right at 5 30 a worker pulled up and shut things down much to the chagrin of the kids. Why they can't have it running more often is beyond me. 1 hour on Friday was clearly not enough, especially when opened late. Maybe 2-3 hours on Friday and 5-6 on Saturday. 

They should consider having time for younger kids on the jumping pad, who are bounced off by the older kids. On Saturday there were at least 40 kids, some pre-teens/teenagers from girl scouts. My 4 year old was having trouble staying on the pad because "it is too bouncy". Kids come and go as it stays open longer, but little kids have trouble keeping up. 

The pedal carts were a good idea in practice, but have 2 faults. 1. They are EXTREMELY hard to pedal. I tried two carts, one was totally stuck on an incline and the second barely made it around the track. I have no idea why they are so difficult to use. 2. There are no tandem carts. The only ones using the carts while I was there were little kids who couldn't use the jumping pad. I had my daughter on my lap while on the cart, but it was awkward to use this way. Either having a two seater or side car would have worked out better. Based on the condition of the other carts in the shed, only a few appeared usable. 

Clear signs are needed. Lots of cars were going the wrong way down loop A. The road is barely big enough for 1 car, so having to accommodate 2 is even more problematic, especially with kids walking around. There were at least 10 cars going the wrong way in the loop. 

The limit of 2 cars per site isn't enforced. A few sites had 3 cars, which fit ok. A pack of cub scouts were hiking a few of the trials, so a few sites had 4 or 5 cars. The sites were not big enough to fit that many cars plus camping equipment, so they started taking up the road. This made it hard to maneuver, especially with little kids running about in the road unsupervised. 

All in all it was a great campground and I truly do appreciate the staff trying to provide a few things for families to do. With a few considerations and improvements, this campground could easily be a 5-star location.

PROS 

Very nice small Montgomery County Park 

No reservation fee to make on-line reservations 

Reserved 137 days prior to arriving 

Entrance gate required entry code Instructed by staff via gate phone to proceed to campsite as check-in at camp store is at dead end with insufficient turning space for pickup towing 28ft bumper pull; complete check-in after camper was unhooked at site

 Great night sky viewing as no lights what so ever in camping loops except for toilet/shower buildings 

Lots of vegetation between sites providing privacy from neighbors 

Site#D69 shady 

Very quiet campground 

Site#D69 level side-to-side but we were forced to greatly elevate front of trailer to level front-to-back 

Site#D69 gravel parking pad 

Wooden/metal picnic table that was moveable 

Metal fire pit with cooking grate 

Toilet/shower facility very clean 

3 washers and 3 dryers, along with folding tables in the basement of the check-in building. Accepted credit card for $1.75/load 

Harper’s Ferry National Historical park 35 miles from Park 

Walmart and Wegman’s 5 miles from Park 

CONS 

Out-of-state campers pay higher camping fee than Maryland residents,$66/night 

No senior or veteran discount 

Trees falling on Park power lines caused power outage for hours 

No toilet/shower facility in FHU loop so had to hike to facilities in Loops B & E

No camp host 

No ranger patrolling thru campsite 

No WIFI 

1 bar Verizon

This is our second time here. This place is quiet the spaces are big. They can accommodate large campers,ours is 35 ft. Tent camping have big areas. Lost of nature trails.