We stayed at the Big Island Campground in the beginning of August. The sites seemed pretty large to us. My kids loved skipping rocks at the little shore at the entrance to the big island. You cannot swim in the lake but there are canoes and kayaks to rent. We really enjoyed our time here. Rangers were super nice and helpful. We hiked about 5 miles, saw a few deer and other animals. Bathrooms were very nice and clean. All of us that remembered to reapply bug spray didn't have any bites.

We stayed at Blue Mounds at the very end of July and it was a great first tent camping experience! We stayed in site 73E which was a little secluded from the rest of the campground but was across from the parking lot.  We stayed on a Sunday night so being at the entrance of the park/across from the parking lot wasn't really an issue at all but I could see if it was a Friday/Saturday it might be.  We only stayed one night so didn't use the showers but the bathrooms were very nice and clean. We weren't able to hike as much as I would have liked but my kids 5/9 still made it about 3 miles on one of the loops and we found our hiking club password. We didn't have any issues with bugs. Luverne is super close and we hit up Tasty's Drive In for supper and it was great!