Camping at Kiptopeke State Park

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Kiptopeke State Park

5/7 Stars for Kiptopeke State Park

I was really excited to book a site at this campground, as I had never heard of Kiptopeke State Park before and I had never driven that far down Rt. 13. Excited for this new stretch of road, we packed up the dogs and camper and headed our usual way towards Ocean City. Once we got close, though, we turned south and traveled for a while towards the southernmost tip of the Virginia part of the eastern shore.  The park is alllllll the way at the bottom, right on the Chesapeake.

Kiptopeke State Park, VA

The drive, as it turned out, was not as exciting as I was hoping it would be. We passed a lot of gas stations and convenience stores....some farms...but pretty much it looks the same from Ocean City down to Kiptopeke. I was a bit disappointed and this feeling continued when we got to the actual campsite. It was tiny and it was muddy, crammed in between two giant RV's. The site did not have a pad, so we were trying to park the Aliner in mud, which is not an easy feat when you also need to level the thing. We kept sinking and finally had to get some plywood to put over the mud pit. People were stopping to ask if we needed help because we couldn't get the damn thing parked and were blocking the campground road. This was one of our early trips with the camper and we still were not that good at parking it.

Anyway, as you would have it, this is one of those campgrounds that would be a good example of "camping IRL" as opposed to "camping on Instagram." Close-in, the site, and the idea of it, looked cool. Zoom out, though, and you'll see trailers squeezed next to trailers. I wish I was more into taking pictures at this point because you would have gotten a good laugh at this situation. (I normally keep my phone locked and away during camping since the point of camping it to unplug and be present. Now, since I want better pictures for the blog, I put my phone on airplane mode and take pictures. I still don't really like having my phone out--it's too tempting to open it up and check apps/messages/etc., so I am contemplating going back to the year 2005 and buying a digital camera....we'll see.)

The good news about this park is that if you can get over being crammed into your site, it is pretty neat, which is why it's packed full in the summer. We could only get a random reservation from like a Tuesday-Thursday. There are some shipwrecks off shore that create a quiet lagoon next to the park and it's fun to walk the dogs on the shoreline. The dogs are not allowed on the swim beach, but you can walk them on the shoreline outside of the beach boundary. Next to the campground there are also meadow trails that we walked in that were quiet and empty. We did not see any off leash dogs, but they also had a dog park that dogs could run around in off-leash, so maybe that helped.

If you have dogs that like to kayak, bring the kayak along! I brought my stand up paddle but the dogs were NOT happy about being on the SUP, so that was the end of that idea. (I have NOT given up on my dream of having a SUP dog yet, so stayed tuned to see which dog I attempt to train next.)

Our camping routine at this park was to start the morning with a walk along the shoreline. Eventually you will get to a boundary marker for the park, so that's where we would turn around. If the dogs wanted to swim a bit and there was no one else around, we would let Porter and Cheeze paddle in the water a bit. (Gussie HATES WATER with a burning passion.)

After the morning walk, we would have a nice breakfast at the campsite, making sure no one popped around the corner of their giant RV's and spooked the dogs, and then we would cool off/read inside the camper for a while. The midday walk was usually just around the campground, and in the evening we would take them to the trails in the meadow next to the park. I enjoyed these trails as no one was on them and since they were on the bluff above the water, you could get a view of the water at certain places.

Ultimately, due to the closeness of the sites, I do not recommend this campground for those of us traveling with more than one rescue dog. It was too squashed and too busy. If you have a dog that loves swimming and splashing, though, this is a great place to take them. I hope to take just Cheeze back at some point to get him some water time.

If you ever go camping at Kiptopeke State Park with your dogs, please lets us know how it goes in the comments!

Kiptopeke State Park: 5/7

	Car camping accessible
	Decent space at site
	6-8 ft. wide/emptyish walking trails accessible from campground.
	Rangers enforcing leash requirements.
	Site cleaned prior to arrival.
	Quiet/lack of busyness
	Fire pit on site