Hamilton Branch State Park

[Warren Mary Ellen]

Stopped here on our tour of state parks and checked out the campground at Hamilton Branch State Park. It is located on Lake Strom Thurmond (Lake Clarks Hill if you have an old map or are from Georgia). There are 2 other state parks on the SC side of this large man-made lake. This area of SC is known as the Lakelands Region as it is bordered on by 2 Corps along the border with Georgia and on the other side in the interior are 2 more man made lakes. There are also a lot of Corps of Engineers campgrounds in the area as well as US Forest Service campgrounds nearby as a lot of this area is part of the Sumter National Forest. The towns nearby are pretty small, but you are about 45 minutes Aiken, SC and a similar distance to the even larger Augusta, GA. The park has a boat ramp and hiking/mountain Biking trails including one that connects to trail that continues in the national forest. About 30 minutes away is Abbeville, SC which has an old, Opera House that has some plays. The town is an old, historic town that claims to to be both the birthplace/deathplace of the Confederacy. It is where Jefferson Davis' cabinet told him to give up on the war. There are several good restaurants there but they can be busy if there is a play in town. And if you know the movie, Sleeping with the Enemy, it was filmed there including a scene in the old opera house.

The campground has 180 sites but is divided into a lot of mini loops. Each loop has no more than around 25 at the most. The sites were large, most were back-in, we saw several where the gravel area of the site was large enough to do a U-turn with your Camp-Inn in tow. Many had two sites, they separated at a T, with one each direction. These sites were at least 30 feet off of the road through the campground which would be nice compared to some where you are pretty close to the road. The sites had a lot of space between them with a lot under story beneath the pines overhead, so you would have a lot of privacy. Sites were gravel, with picnic table and fire ring. Most of them were on the water and if you have a kayak or canoe, you could take off from your site. We did notice the bathrooms were towards the front of the loops so you would need to judge how far from the restroom you would want to be.

Great place if you don't mind be the remoteness the area provides. A lot of lake activities and there are the other 2 state parks, Hickory Knob and Baker Creek which are pretty close by on the same lake. See my review on Hickory Knob, but between the two, this campground is far nicer. It was not horrible but this was one better we thought. Baker Creek is seasonal and won't be open for another couple of months so I cannot compare the two. You will be about 45 minutes from I-20. Probably not a grocery store close by, so I would check supplies carefully before heading in.

Hamilton Branch | South Carolina Parks Official Site

 

[Warren Mary Ellen]

Now we've stayed here and the review I did just looking around is pretty accurate. Most campgrounds with 180 sites are busy but we found this to be extremely quiet. With many loops you are never around than about 20 sites. Almost all the sites are on the water so they are all on one side of the road. Bathrooms are spaced out but we had close by on Loop D. Bathhouses were some of the best we've seen anywhere. Great place for bike riding the roads of the park or walking them too. Mountain bike trail connects to the Forest Servie trails. The park does rent bikes and kayaks

It is remote. The nearest grocery is 15 miles away in McCormick although there is a Dollar General about 2 miles away. A lot of this area is the Long Cane District of the Sumter National Forest.

The only think I think they need to improve is they did not have enough gravel on the site. The sites are large but they are the red clay that much of the SC Piedmont is made of. We had several strong showers and the site held a good bit of water and was pretty muddy. If you haven't seen the red clay I am talking about, it stains anything it comes in contact with.

We will definetely go back here since the overall experience was good. Nice lakeside sites with plenty of space between neighboring sites. This is probably not one we would have visited if we had not done the SC State Park's Ultimate Outsider Quest to visit all the parks. This is a nice gem of a place.