A.W. Marion State Park Campground

Small outdated park, you have to drive through a rural residential area to get here. Sites are narrow and short and few are anything close to level. Once on your pad you have to be careful coming out of your rig, most slope downhill. We stayed in site 56, had to back the motorhome up to the block and the jacks are over the edge of pad. Probably 2-1/2 -3' off ground. Very quiet with mostly just woods noise, quite relaxing. Trails around the lake and a marina. I was told the smallmouth fishing is good. If you decide to come make you you set your coordinates for the campground because it is across the lake from the marina and to get there you have to drive 5.5 miles around the lake if you go there first. Camphost was less than friendly. We waved he ignored. :/
Camp store wasnt open when we arrived Sunday 3pm. They didn't tag our site as reserved but had tags for the weekends already on the post.
The road leading into the campground needs some serious pot hole filling. Speed limit says 20 if you go over 5 you will be sorry.

Receptacles are all old and crusty looking but the power was steady and reliable.

Nothing really nearby to see. A couple other state parks within 40 miles. Convenient to launch a kayak or canoe, there is a road in the campground that leads down to the lake. Questionable launching though, lots of mud. There is a nice restroom on the road coming in and they have portajohns around the campground. Small playground for kids.
There is a dump station and a couple different places to get water.

Having said all that, it is still a nice quiet campground to get away too. On Sunday there were only 5 campers here.

We live in Ohio and if you are 60 you can get a Golden Buckeye card from the Government, this gives you 50% sunday through thursday and 10% off on weekends. So we only paid $12 a night

October weekends in Ohio State Park campgrounds are super popular so we weren’t able to make a reservation here. They do have a few walk up sites and we got there on a Thursday to make sure we got one. We luckily did and enjoyed our time at this campground. They do have flush toilets now, so that was nice. There is a trail that goes around the lake that you can walk and there is also a mountain biking trail. We took advantage of both and really enjoyed them! The campground is relatively small, but it was nice! We were there as the leaves were changing and it was great! Our Sprint and Verizon hotspots both got great service here too. We were happy with this campground!

I absolutely loved this little gem. Lots of mature trees, spacious sites, and solid Verizon signal made this a terrific state park experience.

The sites are electric, only, or non-electric, with water hydrants spread throughout the campground. A dump station is also available.

Bathrooms were available but I used my own facilities.

My site was fairly level and had plenty of shade, although the camper was never in shade.

Each site has a pole for lanterns, fire ring, and picnic table. The picnic tables have seen better days, but they work.

The camp host were very friendly and helpful, even lending and helping me fill my freshwater tank with his giant 100' hose so that I didn't have to break camp to refill.

Locals like to drive through and check out the campers so it can feel a bit like a petting zoo.

There is not a lot for kids to do, but that is probably why it was so quiet.

This was my second stay at this delightful campground.

Notes specific to 2021: The Brood X cicadas were there and they were gross. Also, the lake is drained This year as work on the dam takes place.

This park is really ideal for smaller trailers. Most sites are short and narrow.

New in 2021 is that the road through the electric sites area and all of the site driveways has fresh asphalt. This created a nice, smooth experience, but it also seemed to add to the steepness of the dropff from the site driveway to the ground.

The sites on the outer ring of the electric sites area have more privacy and are wooded.

I love that there are still smaller campgrounds like this available. If you camp during the week, it is a very peaceful experience.

Solid 3 bars of Verizon with 63.7mps download and 453 kbps upload speeds. O had great connection for Teams calls and work.

Paved campground streets and driveways that are very close together with no foliage separating sites. Large trees along the perimeter, and a few in the middle of the loop, provide some shade. A water spigot to fill the tank is available at the beginning of the loop but requires blocking the street while filling. Dump station is easily accessible on the way out and includes a threaded water connection for tank flush. No potable water at the dump station.

We stayed over a weekend in late September when the electric section of the campground was full. OH State law prohibits loud noise and public drinking in state parks but that didn’t deter one loud, drunken, profane group nor compel the camp host to stop it. The host just rode by in his golf cart and waved, thereby condoning their behavior. In over two years of full-time travel, and after volunteering two summers as campground hosts in very busy National Forest and USACE campgrounds, we are fully aware of the weekend atmosphere but this was one of the worst camping experiences we have had. We will be sure to select a different campground for our next visit to the area.

It’s a nice quiet campground. The lake is beautiful, it even has an outdoor screen for movies if you have a projector.

The park seemed small, and it was okay, just not one of my favorite state parks. We are on a journey to see all 88 state parks in Ohio. We saw 4 on this particular day, and it was our least favorite. That being said, it's still has beauty, and fishing and water so it's not all bad. Our favorite thing was their camping area w/outdoor movie theater. We didn't see any wildlife hardly while we were there. It could of been the gunshots from the nearby hunters scared them off.