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very crowded but staff does all they can to make this enjoyable. The rich black dirt gets tracked into the bath house, but again the staff are in there just about hourly to mop up. I stayed winter of 2013, In the spring they closed this place for 8-10 months to renovate the bath houses and I was told to also change the layout of the campsites. I hope so...

When everyone had tents or small campers this probably was a great place. With the buses and huge 5th wheels of the past decade the spots became crowded.

There are plenty of things to do here, including swings and slides for kids a quick bike ride away, or about 5-10 minutes walk from the camp ground. There is a canoe rental to take you into the mangrove swamps.

There is a small loop just for tenters or small campers.

Not far from shopping and restaurants toward Naples. Marco Island is just a few minutes away. The Everglades and all that offers are close by. I went in February and had a very pleasant time, but I heard that you want to stay away in bug season, which is from May to October.

The wife and I stayed for two weeks at Myakka River February, 2015. There are three camping loops in the park. We stayed in the one furthest from the entrance, Big Flats campground. This is an OK campground for tent or trailers or smaller motorhomes. Turns are a little tight for large motorhomes. Sites 1 to 5 backup to a pumping station. The pump cycles on and off until about 10PM. As one camper put it “you get used to it”. Well we didn’t in site 5. Sites 21-26 would be best for tent campers, but really anything other than sites 1-5 are good. All of the sites as far as I could tell got some shade sometime during the day from the many trees. I heard stories that sites 10 to 14 often would get bombarded by buzzard turds as they roost high in the trees above these sites. There are hundreds of buzzards in the area, and when they are all in the sky in the afternoon it it quite a sight. There are also signs around that buzzards will attack windshield wiper blades and other rubber items for some reason. I did not see or experience this.

There is the Palmetto Ridge Campground which seemed to me to be best suited for larger motorhomes and trailers. Not so good for tent camping. This is the most modern of the campgrounds with not much shade. The other campground, Old Prairie, seemed like a relic from the past. The campsites are small and close together and the facility seemed dated. I did not use it so I don’t know how modern the facility is, but it did not look promising.

Myakka River has many things of interest going on inside the park. The Big Flats loop is close, easy walking distance, to the camp concession area that provides a WIFI hotspot. That area has picnic tables, and a chidrens playground. The concession area rents canoes, bikes and there is an available one hour airboat ride around the lake which was pretty much full most of the time when I was there in February. There is a guided riding tour on a truck pulled train, and 2 separate gift concessions besides one at the park entrance. There is a tree walk trail where you climb high into a tower and walk over a bridge into the tree top canopy to another tower 100 feet away where you climb down on stairs. There is a bridge over the river where many people bird watch and fish. There seemed to be many local visitors to the park besides just campers.

I have to also add that in nearby Sarasota, there is a fabulous Amish farmers market called Detwilers Farm Market that should not be missed. Get there EARLY. The best strawberries when in season. Check out reviews on Tripadvisor for exact location. Parking is tight and you should NOT go there while hooked up with a trailer or driving a motorhome. I will go to Myakka River campgrounds again if I can get another reservation for this popular camping spot.

I was there in mid-October. No body else was there except maybe 1 or 2 trailers and two tenters. Very few bugs. Only 2 campsites had any shade and they were taken. Just a big loop with plenty of open space to park a big rig. We tent camped and found it to be pleasant enough once the sun got low in the sky. Otherwise it was pretty warm, but not as humid as it could have been. There are two small primitive toilet facilities; one had running water. Each site had a table and a fire pit. Be sure to bring everything you are going to need as there are no nearby stores. Cell towers within sight so at least we were well connected.

I stayed here Feb, 2015. There is not really a bad campsite in the place although some are better than others. They are all flat, many were pull through. There is no separating plant life although most of the campsites were not right next to each other giving some privacy. Bath house was clean and pretty modern. Great place to ride a bike around the campgrounds and I heard there were many off-road bike paths also but I did not use them. The campground had an area for horse camping so I suspect that horse trails also abound. Not to far from the campsites were huge electrical towers that had an abundance of predator birds in huge nests. Great for wildlife viewing. At night we were visited often by armadillos, that would wander into the campsite and be gone as fast as they came in. They never caused any problems and were fun to watch pretty close up. Bugs were not bad at all this time of year. I believe there is a swimming pool but of course it was closed for the season in February.

Not far up the road north toward Plant City are places to shop for food and do laundry. You are not far from fresh produce at one of several stands we found around the area.