Cody’s blog

Hickory Run State Park
3 Family Camp Rd
White Haven, PA 18661-9712

272-808-6192

May 12 – 16, 2025

This was the second park of our May trip. We headed out from the previous park at 10 AM and arrived at Hickory Run around 1 PM, after a smooth, easy drive. I checked in, found out where my site was, and went to fill my water tank. There was supposed to be a water fill at the dump site (which I didn’t see at the time, but on my way out at the end of the trip, I did see it there, oops!) So I went back into the park, circled one of the loops and found an empty site with a water hookup, so I snuck in and filled my tank there, before locating my site, which was almost completely level! Yay!

After resting a bit, I went out to check out the bathhouse. The nice, new bathhouse almost directly behind my site turned out to be under construction and closed. Bummer. Beyond that was a waterless restroom with vault toilets. Figured I’d just use the facilities in the van. There was also a water spigot between the two sites to my left, both of which appeared to be closed, so I figured if I needed more water, I could drive over there. And roll my cassette over to the vault toilets to dump. But neither of those contingencies turned out to be necessary.

My brother and sister-in-law stopped by at around 4:30 to check out my site, and then we drove around the campground. Their site was about a mile from mine, so no walking between sites! The campground appeared to be mostly tent sites with a few electric loops and even fewer full hookups.

We stopped by the Visitor Center and went through the nature exhibits. One big rock/boulder display had a little tunnel through one corner, with windows inside showing various critters that lived among the rocks. I didn’t want to crunch my knees on the hard floor, so I sat and pushed myself through on my butt.

After that, we stopped at the camp store. Technically, it was closed but the guy was there bringing in stock, and said we could come in and look but if we wanted to buy anything we’d have to pay cash. I wanted a t-shirt, but didn’t see the one I wanted in my size. He said that was what he was unloading, so he went and found one for me.

Then we went to their site and hung out for a little while. Their site was one of apparently only two sites with full hookups — the other being the camp host. Theirs was at the end of the loop, right beside the bathhouse. But no near neighbors.

Tuesday, we headed out at 10 AM to visit Hawk Falls. My brother decided not to brave the trails, so my sister-in-law and I hiked about three quarters of a mile on uneven, rocky paths through the woods until we finally found the falls. It was raining lightly, but we were mostly protected under the trees.

It was not an easy hike, but the falls were very pretty when we finally reached them.

After the falls, we stopped in town to pick up pizza for lunch and some other foods for later. We went to their trailer to eat and hang out for a while and then they drove me back to my site.

That evening, I discovered that there was a mouse in the van. I’d heard scrabbling around the night before, but wasn’t sure until that evening I saw that the paper towels had been shredded and some of the food packages had been chewed open. I cleaned everything up and put away the remaining foods in the top cupboard and hoped the mouse would go away during the night, since I didn’t have any mouse traps or deterrents in the van.

No such luck, the next day the mouse had continued to leave droppings in the drawers and chew up more paper towels. I cleaned everything up again, took the van out and dumped tanks, then stopped by J&J’s trailer to take a shower in the bathhouse and borrow some mouse traps and peanut butter for bait. Other than that, it was a rainy, stay-at-camp day.

I caught the mouse within hours of putting out the traps. Unfortunately, it was caught by one arm and shoulder and not killed by the trap (I hate spring traps, I would rather not kill any living creature if I don’t have to, but if I do, I want it to be as quick and painless as possible, and spring traps all too often catch the mouse by the leg or tail and don’t kill them), so I put it outside on the picnic table, hoping it would finish dying on its own. I didn’t want to free it, in case it decided to come back in the van. After waiting a while, it didn’t show any signs of dying, so I moved it over to a rock and dropped a rock on it. Felt like such a murderer but finally killed the mouse. Made up my mind to mouse-proof the van and get some mouse repellent when I got home, so this sort of thing wouldn’t happen again. Very stressful.

Thursday, we drove out to Sand Springs Lake, where there is a small beach and a low dam where the water flows out from the lake to a stream. I also saw a pretty tiny fluffy pine tree. I love pines, but don’t have any where I live. I am always tempted to sneak one of these cute little baby pines home with me (I won’t).

Then we drove to another area where there was a CCC Dam crossing the end of a lake (I think it was a different lake but I don’t remember now). It was a neat-looking dam, consisting of a stone wall with a trough running across it for the water to flow over. We could walk over the dam to the other side of the lake, where we could look back to the playground near the parking area. We walked along the side of the lake to a bush of pretty pink flowers, then up the bank to the picturesquely named Shades of Death Trail. The brochure said it was a mile out and back and Very Difficult hiking, but the end where we were it was very flat and level. But we didn’t venture out any farther.

We went back to their trailer for tea, and then they dropped me at my van. We’d thought about going out again that afternoon, but with the rain, we just stayed at camp.

Friday we packed up and came home. Had a very stressful drive home, through heavy rain and thunderstorm. The rain was coming down in sheets, stirring up clouds of mist, and it was so dark I could barely see. Most drivers were slowing down. For a while, I drove with 4-way flashers on to make it easier to be seen. But after half an hour or so, the rain let up enough, and it was light enough to see where I was driving. It continued to rain until I was about 30 miles from Binghamton, and it was sunny and warm when I got home!

Geezers on the Hickory Run State Park in the Pennsylvania Poconos, wet & wild