East Harbor State Park

We have now played in four out of five of the Great Lakes on our trip so far after our recent visit to East Harbor State Park near the Marblehead Peninsula in Ohio. We also camped here for a couple of days since the park is part of Passport America and has pretty modern facilities.

The park is very nice with several trails and over 1500 feet of beachfront. We were basically the only ones on the beach besides a few older bird watchers. It was only in the sixties while we were there and it rained quite a bit, but it was decent the afternoon we went to the beach and all of our boys played in the water and the sand and got their squirt guns out too!

Speaking of bird watching we had two first time spots here - a group of sanderlings and another bunch of common terns, as well as a groundhog! We saw other birds as well including sea gulls, great egrets, pelicans and a red tailed hawk. Patsy saw a bald eagle driving to the park and I saw a muskrat on our way there as well.

Since we camped there we will do our campground review:

Nearby attractions - 8 - Close to Toledo and Sandusky and within a couple of hours of Cleveland.

Staff - 8 - Spoke with three friendly camp hosts.

Natural surroundings - 7 - Plenty of trees and close to Lake Erie and harbors.

Value - 9 - We paid $17.50 a night for a pull-through black-top site with full hook-ups.

Bathrooms - 8 - Large, plenty of hot showers. Clean for a state park.

Roominess - 8 - Normal sized lots.

Facility fun - 8 - Playground, beach, fishing, marina, activities, bike rentals, nature center open in summer.

Cleanliness - 8 -  Better than state park clean!

Facility usefulness - 7 - Dump station, fire rings, camp store, picnic tables.

Overall - 9 - One of the most modern campgrounds we have encountered at a state park so far!