We arrived at Santee SP on Lake Marion east of Elloree yesterday and found it to be…interesting.

You know how usually you pull into a park and find a check-in kiosk? We found a signpost. And went miles and miles down what appeared to be an ancient state road to turn left as the sign indicated to an office. It was a bait shop; the office was the next building over.

After a tidbit of heated discussion we got checked and sent to the campground…a few miles away. So we went back out to the signpost and turned left. We bounced and jounced along past the Sinkhole Trail, past another big sinkhole along the road, only to end up on a dirt road that had a bit of hard dirt between the potholes.

It was where we wanted to be.

We had to drive all the way around the CG just for the idiot to miss the turn and go around again. Seems that Mom didn’t sign up to go off-roading.

We found our spot and the idiot executed a 50-point turn between the trees and stuck that sucker right in there. Thank you for your applause.

It took a bit of manuevering to get past the trees.

Today we’re futzing around. A couple who had been here a while informed us that no showerhouses on this end of the park have hot water. I informed Mom that our outdoor shower works fine; if they can’t provide us hot water we’ll make ’em suffer.

Mountain-girl Mom does the hunter-gatherer thing.

Since it’s Friday the park’s filling up. A local couple showed up next site with a poontang boat. You know, a poontang  boat, one that has floats on each side and you anchor out in the lake and get some. A poontang boat. Anyway, they’re nice folks.

I really like this park. Campsites aren’t very close; they’re hollerin’ close but not too close. The entire thing here is a place to camp while you go fishing.

Lake Marion is huge and offers some good fishing.

However, the campsites are hemmed in by trees. Although our campsite is 50+ feet, it was impossible to get in without running over the neighbor’s fire pit and I don’t  know how we’ll get out. That’s a topic for another day.

We’ll be back.

251 State Park RD | Santee, SC 29142 | Phone: 803-854-2408 | Fax: 803-854-4834 | santeesp@scprt.com

Huntington Beach would be an awesome place to be in the summer. Unfortunately yrs truly doesn’t have that much sense.

The park’s on Terrapin Road. I love the name. We trundled across a bridge to the park office and found two huge beach chairs. We got checked in and found our spot in the campground on the second try because the idiot driving didn’t notice the numbers, then got all situated in the cold rain.

Mom’s a kid again.

The next day was still cold and wet so we stayed in; there isn’t a whole lot to do at a beach park when it’s cold and rainy. The next day was Mom’s birthday and we got to get out and wander around. The beach would’ve been extremely perfect in the summertime.

The coast from Cape Romain northward is called the Grand Strand.

Campsites are all level gravel, some shady and some not, satellite tv worked and Sprint internet not so much. The sites are huge. Although there was no vegetation between sites where we were there was a lot of distance.

The campsites are huge with plenty of space between them.

You can take a tour of Atalaya, the Huntington beach house. It looks a lot like a jail to me but I guess the ironwork kept the large critters out.

Although this probably won’t be a destination park for us we’ll definitely return if passing by.

16148 Ocean HWY | Murrells Inlet, SC 29576 | Phone: 843-237-4440 | Fax: 866-890-3977 | huntingtonbeach@scprt.com