Camping with Dogs & Friends at Maryland's Big Run State Park-Ruff 1st Visit

ericamargaret5
Dec 14, 2025
5 min read

Updated: 3 days ago

Big Run State Park

3/7 star rating — 3/7-We did not have a good first visit here BUT it was circumstantial. We would visit again under different conditions.

I came across this park when I was trying to find a last minute group campground for our fall trip, and man, is this a pretty place. When you wake up, you hear the creek burbling and the whippoorwills whipoorwilling. The mountains surround the campground in a hazy green ring and the valley has a big field that allows you to step back and take it all in. In the morning, we enjoyed walking the dogs to the reservoir and letting them get their fill of scents.

Every fall we try and get our friends for a big group trip, but due to my dog collecting habit and my friends' dog and baby collecting habit, each trip has been a tiny disaster. After a few of these trips, I didn't think my friends would want to do anymore group camping, so I stopped booking them, thinking that was that. Only, it wasn't. As soon as the first fall breeze blew through in August, my buddies started inquiring about the fall camping trip. My first reaction: "Yay! I still have friends!" My second reaction: "Crap! I didn't book anything."

I hit the reservation websites and found a group campground for early November at Big Run. It looked good to me and it was going to have to do. This post details our experience camping with reactive dogs at Maryland's Big Run State Park.

The drive out to Big Run was pretty straightforward, but we arrived at night, and since in was early November, the sun was setting fast. Like any campground, getting there at night, for the first time, was not ideal and this was no exception. We had to drive the camper down a tiny, windy road in the dark and we drove right past the group campsite on the way in. PAY ATTENTION-The campground sneaks up on you! Missing the campground turn, for me, is a bad omen because if I miss a turn as the navigator (I have one job!) and my husband has to do a u-turn with the camper, he becomes a very UNHAPPY camper.

We luckily had booked a separate site for the camper a few sites down from the group site so it was okay that we drove past it; we parked in there and set up.

Across the way from us was another group site filled with dudes, pick up trucks, a pavilion and HUGE FIRE in a stone fireplace with a chimney. (I had clearly booked the wrong group campsite, as our site had none of those.)

Once we set up the camper, we walked down the road to the group campsite we had rented (the Creekside Group Site), and on the way, flagged down our friend who was driving down the road and had driven right past the group campground.

I thought the site itself was small for the amount of cars it allowed (6 cars & 12 people), but discounting that, the location of the site right next to a creek and a hiking trail was pretty neat.

Saturday morning, we sat around and drank coffee next the creek, and once we all had breakfast, we packed up our backpacks and hit the hiking trail that was right across the street.

The trail across from the campsite, the "Monroe Hiking Trail" was too long for our group (~9 miles out and back total), so we just did a shorter "out and back" and enjoyed what was left of the changing leaves.

That evening, the sun went down EARLY. Our trip was the first weekend in November, so WE KNEW the sun was setting earlier, but since the campground was in the valley, the sun popped right down behind the mountains and we realized we really did NOT KNOW. That was the end of the sunlight and the end of the fun.

Also, there was a fire ban in effect for this weekend, so we couldn't light a fire. When I first found this out, I emailed the group to see if anyone still wanted to go, and the answer was a resounding "yes." So, we came prepared. When the sun went down, I thought I was funny and put fake plastic flames that I had ordered off of Amazon into the fire pit to make it look like we had a fire.

Then my friend took out a little "campfire in a can" and we stared at that for a while.

When that finally went out, we stared forlornly at the empty, not-so-funny fire ring until someone fired up the Baby-Q to make hot dogs and we used it to warm our hands instead. Despite the layers, we were popsicles and the dogs were pupsicles, and I learned that camping without a fire is not camping.

Cuddling with a cold dog. — Frozen Cheeze trying to cuddle to get warm.

Meanwhile, our friends down the road in the other group campsite had a huge fire going. Damn it.

We called it a night. The next morning rain was rolling in, so we all just gave up and started packing to go home. While walking the dogs around the campsite to calm them down before the drive home, a big, friendly lab that was not leashed came running towards us. And, of course, since we had already survived a day and didn't see many dogs, let alone people, around the campground, I did not have Mabel's muzzle on her. Shame on me.

For those of you with dog-reactive dogs, you know that an off leash dog, friendly or not, is my worst nightmare. I screamed "My dogs are not friendly," but the owner was not in earshot. The lab first tried to say hi to Cheeze and Porter, who were with Chris and ahead of me, realized they were not nice, and then made his way over to Mabel, Gussie, and I. Mabel went totally nuts. The owner finally came running over when he heard the dogs barking and growling but it was too late: my dogs were upset and stressed and Mabel had bit a hole in my pants out of displaced frustration. I mean, we were ALREADY having so much fun on this trip and this really added to it.

We all packed up and headed home. The drive in daylight, if it was any consolation prize, was such a scenic treat of rolling green hills and fields.

Just another unsuccessful group trip for the books.

Overall Rating for Big Run State Park

	Car Camping It was very easy to find and access the site.
	Campsites have decent space. The sites had nice spacing between them and trees and brush to break up the sight lines.
	6-8 ft wide walking trails accessible from the campground. Some tight spots close to the water, so we stayed in the woods and the field. We felt we could get some walks in without being on top of other dogs .
	Rangers enforcing leash requirements. The rangers were out patrolling the sites. We did not see off-leash dogs on this trip.
	Quiet Nice and quiet!!
	Fire Pit on Campsite .
	Site Cleaned Prior to Arrival