Gulpha Gorge Campground

We stayed 3 nights in site 40 which is creek side. There were a lot of thunder storms (one each night) so creek was running strong and lovely sound of water. Very clean, quiet, trees everywhere, nice hosts. Our tow vehicle wouldn’t fit with our 33’foot class A but there is overflow parking right there so no issue at all. Access to trail from campground and nice walking areas inside park. Oh, and fireflies which I loved seeing!

When walking the dog we noticed that when by sites near the road, you could hear road noise. So just be aware of that.

Also, we watched a couple people try to get into sites that were long enough for them however there were trees or light poles that prevented them from making it into their spot. One was a Class A somewhere around 40 ft tried to get spot 38 and the other was a 5th wheel likely 35 feet trying the spot across from spot 38. Again the spots were long enough, they just couldn’t make the angles work to park. The camp hosts worked it out for them somehow by moving site or they swapped. Not sure how but they seemed to be able to stay in park which is great. Just likely stressful so I wanted to mention. Not sure how you could know this from recreation.gov.

Spots I can say had easy big rig access were 39, 40, 41. Smaller rigs I expect have no problems in any sites.

Most sites are very close together, possibly a problem for big rigs. Creekside lots are niceest. There is a lot road noise, worse at sites along the road. Stay is very friendly and shower house is very clean with room to change outside of the actual shower. Lots of trees and shade for most sites. We were shoe-horned into site 46.

The drive southeast to Gulpha Gorge was beautiful as we stayed off the interstates and kept to the fine well-maintained roads through the Ozarks and surrounding farms. Paris, Arkansas was a surprise as it looked like a prosperous and lively little town compared to other struggling ones like Ozark. Arriving at our campground was easy and not at all worth the angst I had previously put myself through based on negative Campendium reviews. We had no problem at all on an August Friday afternoon navigating through the campground and finding our site. It is tight and difficult to back into some of the sites, but not so bad that it causes anxiety.

Site 21 borders the creek and is semi-private as it is the second to last site before the amphitheater. The biggest problem behind us was the swimming and wading hole that any visitor can use, especially non-campers. That also means some unruly children are present with absent-minded parents who fail at teaching their children respect for others, as well as safety. I imagine weekdays are better as you would think most parents have to work. But the weekends could be horrid.

We had a surprise power outage due to an unexpected electrical storm on Friday night moving through the area. Power was not restored until late Saturday night and all it required was a new breaker. Hot and sticky, no showers, and a complete waste of a day. The temperatures were near one hundred degrees.

One lousy bar of ATT and one lousy bar of T-Mobile. Both weak signals. Slow as hell. The camp hosts were good and kept a good eye on their camping guests. The shower rooms had keypad locks and were clean and very nice. Visitors to the National Park are not allowed access to the shower rooms. You are issued a code in your email reservation.

The town of Hot Springs has a decent Ecuadorian restaurant and the historic Bath House Promenade was compelling . The visitors center and museum were very educational and interesting. But the town of Hot Springs was too touristy and Disney-like. We won’t be back.

We had an amazing stay at Gulpha Gorge in Hot Springs National Park. The setting in the gorge makes it feel like you're 100 miles away from town when it's actually just a few minutes drive.

We arrived at 11:30 on a weekday prior to Memorial Day weekend and there were plenty of spots open although we grabbed the last full-hookup site (yes full hook-up's in a national park!) with the creek behind us. The whole campground is first-come, first-serve. Self-register with credit card or cash. Even throughout the holiday weekend, there were a couple sites open at all times. The area is also a day use area so there were a lot of people around during the day but it was also a holiday weekend.

The campsites are spacious enough, not enough vegetation between sites to block the view of your neighbor but we didn't feel like we were on top of each other by any means. All but one site were over 30', even the non-hookup sites. The campground was very clean and well kept. The camp hosts were available and friendly. There are three modern bathrooms but no showers.

There are a ton of trails in the park and they are accessible from the campground and all trails are dog-friendly! It is about a 1.5 mile easy/moderate hike to town. If you prefer to drive, it takes about 3 minutes. If it hasn't rained recently, the creek in the campground can be used for swimming/wading and plenty of people had their dogs playing in the creek as well.

A few sites along a small creek and the rest arranged along a couple parallel loops. The real attraction was either a 1.4 mile hike or a short drive into the town of Hot Springs to tour the bathhouses or grab coffee or a nice dinner. The town is definitely set up for tourism which can go over the line towards kitsch, but the history of health tourism is pretty interesting. Several of the bathhouses are still open for fancy spa treatments and one has been preserved to display the wacky stuff that used to go on there. There are also several spots around where you can fill a water bottle with the mineral rich (but good tasting) spring water, once you let it cool from a boil that is.

This is a comfortable national park campground. There are actually full hookup sites! This is the most "RV park" feeling national park campground we've ever stayed in. And it's a great location. 3 minute drive to Bathhouse Row, or a 1.5 mile hike on the Dead Chief Trail.

We opted for the primitive sites to save some money. Dry camping sites with a mostly level concrete pad are $10 a night. Full-hookup sites, most of which were taken when we arrived, are $30 a night.

Nearest fresh water: Right at the campground entrance.
Nearest dump station: Right at the campground entrance, too.

We stayed in a primitive site #41 and would definitely stay here again.

Wow!!! Our favorite type of campsite: non-reservable, full-service, close to town and decent shopping, hiking opportunities right from the campsite, close to many attractions: Hot Springs NP, Garvan Woodland Gardens, some wonderful lakes, the Clinton Presidential Library and several historical civil rights sites (in nearby Little Rock,) the southern edge of the Ozark Mountains, local art & music festivals, and the list goes on.

Full hookup sites are $30 night ($15 with Golden Age or Interagency Pass) and no hookup sites are $10 (or $5 with the above passes.) There are 44 sites, the best ones are undoubtedly the full service ones along Gulpha Creek: #'s 20, 21, 23 25, 27, 28, 30, 31 & 33. Some of these sites are larger than others, but all are large enough for the biggest rig and all offer very good separation/privacy from your neighbors. Our site (#23) was unarguably the largest and best site of the lot. But you'd be hard pressed to find a bad site among those in this list.

In addition to enjoying all that the Hot Springs area had to offer, we really enjoyed just sitting on the banks of the creek reading our books!

Verizon internet speeds were among the fastest we've ever seen and we were easily able to stream HD video.

As this is a no-reservation (i.e., first come first served) campground, I recommend arriving early in the week to be assured of a site (i.e., Sunday through Wednesday,) especially during the peak family camping season. There are other private campgrounds nearby which could serve as a "Plan B" but in my opinion they are quite inferior to the National Park campground and it would be disappointing to end up in one of those if you had your heart on staying in the National Park.

This is a wonderful spot! Close to town but feels like in the middle of nowhere. Only real noise, other than the sound of the stream outside our window, was trucks using their exhaust breaks on the valley road.

Good connectivity, Full hookup sites.

The park is first come first parked, so we arrived on a Sunday midday. Found a spot no problem (needed some serious leveling though) but it was not on the stream. Camp host was walking by while we had dinner outside and said the guy across from us on the stream was leaving in the morning and we could move if we wanted to. He just had to sign our site slip...

We stayed at Gulpha Gorge CG from June, 2016- August, 2016 as trail hosts (we hiked instead of paying rent for the summer. Happy to answer questions about this if you message me! @hello_casita on Instagram).

Campground:
-FYI - in August, 2016 they started transitioning all campsites into full hookups. There will no longer be any $10 dry camping spots.
-Be sure to check for dead trees above and around your campsite. The landscaping crew has been working to remove hazardous trees, but they can only do so much. We had a tree go thru our roof the first week we were there and it was a painful process to have it fixed.

Connectivity
-The campground has great Verizon service and we were able to stream Netflix consistently without a booster.
- Most establishments downtown offer free wi-fi.

Hiking:
-You can walk into town via Dead Chief Trail > Grand Promenade. To avoid a steep hill where Dead Chief meets the Grand Promenade, take the Reserve Trail spur and road walk a few blocks to Central Avenue (aka, the main street in Hot Springs).

-You can walk to Mickey's BBQ from the campground via the Sunset Trail. Mickeys is open W-Sat 10:30-7:30pm.

-The Arlington Trail takes you to the unlocked 7th Floor outdoor pool & hot tub area at the hotel.

- If you only have time for one hike, the Goat Rock Trail is probably your best bet. It's one of the only hikes where you actually get to a vista point. A nice loop is to combine this with the Upper Dogwood trail.

Food & Drink
-DeLuca's Pizzeria is fabulous. It's expensive, but oh so delicious. And the chef/owner will come out to your table and talk to you.
-Superior Bathhouse has great beer, but crappy service & food.
-Kollective Coffee or Red Light Roastery are great for coffee/tea. Kollective has food
-The Pancake Shoppe is worth the wait, but if you don't want to wait Phil's Restaurant is a wonderful alternative.
-Maxine's has great food and beer selection. But really, really shitty service at the bar.
-The Wine Rack & Spirit's Shoppe on Albert Pike Rd. has an excellent selection of beer/wine/liquor. This is the only place we found for the good stuff. There is a craft beer shop opening downtown in Fall, 2016. FYI - you cannot buy booze in Arkansas on Sunday, but you can buy growlers from restaurants (Superior Bathhouse is your best bet for this).

Things to do
-Garvan Gardens is worth the money. I loved that place so much I bought an annual membership. If you don't want to throw down $20pp, at least go and see the Anthony Chapel by Architect Fay Jones (free access outside of the Garvan Gardens gates).

RV Repairs/Propane
-Razorback RV is the only game in town and they are AWESOME. They put on our roof and have provided lots of free advice over the phone. I would go out of my way to have my trailer fixed here.

Nice access to trails. You can hike into Hot Springs which is nice! The highway next to the campground is noisy and the sites offer little privacy.