Four Different Campground Types...and Why We Chose All of Them!

Be sure to read until the end to see our campground reviews and view pictures of each of the four locations!

We made some great memories in South Florida, all thanks to our ability to stay in one general area for over a month. However, even on the cusp season of spring, finding campground availability in a popular RVing state such as Florida can seem next to impossible. Some of these bookings we needed to make before we were even sure when we were launching on the road! Talk about needing to plan ahead! The plus side of full-time travel, though, is its flexibility. We don't have a specific set of dates we need to be somewhere, and so when planning our travels, we simply see what's available when and build our plans around that.

Besides availability, we had more reasons to choose multiple campgrounds during our stay in Florida. As RV newbies, we still aren't entirely sure what types of campgrounds we like. Do we want primitive sites surrounded by nature, or do we want lots of amenities and easy-to-access resources? Do we want to be in the heart of downtown, or would we rather be more countryside? The plus side is, as RVers, we don't need to choose! Florida was a great opportunity to try a whole variety of campground types, and that's exactly what we did. In our nearly 5 weeks in and around Fort Myers, we stayed at a state park, an RV resort, a private property, and an Army Corps of Engineers campground. The four couldn't be more different, and we learned a lot about which types of campgrounds we'll be booking in the future.

Our first reservation was made way back in summer of 2021 at Koreshan State Park. Florida State Parks are coveted, and for good reason. They're budget-friendly, have good amenities, and are gorgeous. Koreshan is the closest state park to Anthony's parents' house, and so booking a couple weeks there would mean easy access for visits, while enjoying the state park experience back at our site. We lucked out with this reservation, booking the one remaining campsite for these dates (late March-early April), which was only still available because it couldn't accommodate slide-outs. So we snatched it up and gave our slide-out-less toyhauler a pat on the back.

Florida state parks only allow for a maximum of a 14-day stay at one time. We booked at Koreshan for a week. This was Newbie Nicole's tentative way of booking a site without full hookups, as Koreshan only has water and electric (no sewer hookups, but does have a dump station at the park). In August 2021 we had no idea how long we wanted to be without full hookups, and so all we could do was predict what would make us most comfortable.

As we traveled southward and learned our comfort levels more, as well as our tank capacities and limits, we began booking longer stays at water and electric-only sites. The snowbirds slowly started leaving Florida as April progressed, and so we squeezed in a longer stay of 9 nights later in the month. This left us with a gap between our Koreshan stays, which we knew we wanted to fill with a full-hookup site. Cue the RV resort!

Woodsmoke Camping Resort, located just up the street from Koreshan State Park, is a large privately-owned RV park, very similar to where we stayed in Daytona (and owned by the same company, Sun Outdoors). We didn't get the most glamorous site, but we grabbed ourselves a convenient pull-through only 10 steps from the laundry facility. That was a win for us! And so, we spent a week in the hustle and bustle of RV life, joining our fellow Woodsmokers for a game of Bingo in the rec room, watching people do impressive...and the opposite of impressive...jobs getting into their sites, and walking the narrow campground roads to get our 10,000 daily steps.

After completing the Koreshan-Woodsmoke-Koreshan sandwich, we journeyed about 30 minutes north, up to Alva, Florida, east of Fort Myers. We wanted to still be in the same area, but we figured heading a bit north would bite off a chunk of our future travels when we had to leave Florida. Also, there is one really amazing feature up there that we couldn't get anywhere else: The Okeechobee Waterway.

The what now?! The Okeechobee Waterway! A waterway that had been built to connect the eastern and western coasts of Florida, and runs through Lake Okeechobee and the Caloosahatchee River. Why this is important is a different reason for why it's important to us. It's important in Florida because it provides an avenue for boats to get all the way across the state of Florida width-wise. However, in order for it to be safe, a series of locks and dams needed to be built to keep the depths of the water - and therefore the currents - navigable. This is important to us because the Army Corps of Engineers mans much of this waterway, and many of the areas contain campgrounds run by the COE. We had learned from watching RV YouTube channels that COE campgrounds are gems. They're all near water (because COE manages waterways), they're inexpensive, and they're open to the public! So when I found a 10-night stay at WP Franklin Campground right on the Caloosahatchee River, I booked it right up. Only problem was, there was no availability on the day we left Koreshan. We needed to kill time for a few days before heading to WP Franklin.

That's where the private property came in. We needed 3 nights somewhere near WP Franklin to hang our hats. I've really enjoyed using a website/app called HipCamp, where private land owners can rent out spots on their property for campers. This is what I used when we booked ourselves that incredible boondocking spot on the Christmas Tree Farm on our maiden voyage. Having looked at HipCamp availability in the Fort Myers area before, I was familiar with a listing called "Equestrian Retreat." It boasted full hookups which had me intrigued, but I wasn't sure how comfortable we'd feel staying on someone's private land that's not a big giant farm with tons of privacy. Then I thought about it some more. This place had stellar reviews. Tons of people park their RVs on private property through a whole host of apps, like Boondockers Welcome. Also, we've stayed at Airbnbs in guest houses, sometimes even connected to our hosts' house. So why not this? And that's how we booked 3 nights at Saddle Up Stables in Alva, FL.

I'm sure just hearing about all the work it takes to plan is probably overwhelming, and I'd love to go through my process of researching and booking sites, but that'll have to wait for another time. Thankfully, I'm used to planning our roadtrips, so this isn't much different. Plus, over time, we start to rely on a few really good go-to websites and apps, and I've basically created a hierarchy of websites that I comb through when looking for availabilities. Sure, it's time-consuming, but I actually find it quite fun, especially when we can look back on our adventures and see how many different and unique places we've stayed.

To sum up these four different but wonderful places, we'll list some of the advantages and disadvantages of each. We'll also throw in some of our favorite photos from each location.

Koreshan State Park:

Sites: 6, 55, and 46*

Water and electric only, back-in

*We booked site 55 for our second stay but had to switch after discovering that our rig was sinking into the soft sand. They moved us to site 46 which was a wonderful site.

Advantages:

1. Nature feel, while still having the amenities of water, electric, and laundry
2. Beautiful nature walks right outside our campsite, including the bamboo forest!
3. Large sites surrounded by plants and trees
4. Historic site right at the park, plus other activities such as a boat launch and weekly farmer's market
5. Reasonably priced

Disadvantages:

1. Rustic sites make for unpredictable terrain, as we learned the hard way after sinking into the sand at site 55
2. Narrow roads surrounded by woods + uneven sites make it difficult to maneuver large rigs
3. Less amenities than RV parks

Woodsmoke Camping Resort:

Site: 362, pull-thru, FHU

Advantages:

1. Organized and attentive staff
2. Community events most nights of the week
3. Lots of amenities and resources
4. Easily accessible full hook-up sites
5. Nature trail right on site
6. Nice community vibe
7. On a main road just seconds from tons of stores and restaurants

Disadvantages:

1. Narrow sites with not a lot of shade
2. While relatively quiet at night, still not as quiet as the campgrounds in nature
3. Cramped RV parks in the Florida heat can cause sewer and trash to smell more (the trash area was the main culprit here, which was right in the center of the park; good for convenience, bad for smell)
4. Higher price than the other campgrounds we stayed in this area
5. Narrow roads with constant speed bumps throughout the park

Equestrian Retreat HipCamp (Saddle Up Stables):

Site: Oak Haven, FHU*, back-in

Advantages:

1. Wonderful, welcoming hosts
2. Lots of sweet animals including horses, dogs, and chickens
3. Peace and quiet (we were the only campers there when we stayed, though there is one other site)
4. Still close to the main road, but off the beaten path enough to take quiet and safe walks
5. Huge site, plus we had access to most of the property
6. Nice alternative for when more well-known campgrounds are booked

Disadvantages:

1. Hookups not conveniently placed due to the layout of the sites (*We ended up not hooking up sewer because it was in an unreachable place, but we were able to dump before we left)
2. Same price as RV parks in the area
3. Need to do more due diligence when booking and planning

WP Franklin Army Corps of Engineers Campground:

Site: 5 (north campground)

Water and electric only, back-in, river view

Advantages:

1. Small, quiet campground; all sites have a river view
2. Spacious sites with covered picnic tables and fire rings
3. Very easy to back into the sites
4. Reasonably priced
5. Tons of birds and ducks (we think this was Lily's favorite campground to date)
6. Beautiful view of the river and dam from the fishing pier (great fishing too if you're into that!)
7. Both sunrise and sunset views over water

Disadvantages:

1. Very buggy
2. Though spacious, the sites aren't super private
3. Though wide, the sites were not long, barely fitting our truck (there are overflow lots if needed)
4. Further away from shops than any of the other 3 campgrounds
5. Most amenities were on the south side of WP Franklin, but with no connections from one to the other; to get to the south side we needed to drive 17 minutes around the waterway
6. Inconsistent with their security; sometimes the gate was closed at night and others it was not

So can we for sure say which type of campground we liked best? Of course not. There is a time and place for each one. Sometimes we want to have peace and quiet, while others we want to hang out with fellow campers. Sometimes we want to not worry about our tanks, water usage, and electricity, while other times we challenge ourselves to conserve for a while. No matter what, we're making RV life our own, and we know that no matter where we end up, memories will be made and we will continue learning and growing from our experiences, becoming better travelers in the process.