Backbone State Park

the park was clean & well maintained. the camping area is sweet and quiet. we stayed here midweek on a cross country trip.

I had just spent a week in north central Iowa and was going through tree withdrawl. Not many big trees there. Lots here. I felt better. Everyone here seemed to be having a great time. I enjoyed my visit…

WTF, only a few reviews? You lazy pukes!
I spent 3 days here in mid-​May a week ago, and had a fabulous time. You wouldn’t think a boring-​ass place like Iowa had some cool rocky formations and stuff, but hell yeah they do!
After securing a site at the South Lake Campground (more on camping info later) we strolled down the East Lake Trail to get ourselves situated with the area. By the way, the south end of the park doesn’t connect through the park to the northern end, unless you hike that fucker.
If it was hot out, this would be a great place to take the crumb snatchers, Grandma Mabel, and Uncle Mickey. There is plenty of wetness, including a damned lake and the Maquoketa River. Swimming, boating, canoeing and fishing can all be had at this place. Bird watchers will wet themselves here, as we witnessed herons, orioles, turkey vultures and some other birds within the first hour at this place. Saw a bunch of deer, and an owl ripped the balls out of some rodent about 10 feet from my tent the first night. So expect some wildlife sightings.
We took the West Lake Trail to the Backbone Trail, and it was a highlight of our trip. Your legs will be screaming afterwards, but it’s worth it. Moss-​covered bedrock, caves, rock shelters, ferns and lots of animal bones were seen by us. Every once in awhile you’ll run into some young pine groves, which is a blessing.
The Backbone Trail was short but sweet, giving sweeping views of the forest and river. We scrambled down to the base of the cliffs to get out of the sun and rest. While relaxing, some fucktard college-​aged kids came screaming down the trail. We could hear these idiots a mile away. Of course they settled right above us, screaming and ruining our peaceful existence. One of the frat-​party fucks kicked a boulder down the cliff, which also sent a huge log to tumble within 50-​feet of us. Yep, the dipshits could have easily killed us. I told them to calm the fuck down, and they disappeared. Their loud voices didn’t. We should have gone up there and kicked some punk ass, but we didn’t. Idiot punks. Why are people so loud in nature? Shut the fuck up! We found a beach on the river and relaxed and let the idiots up above make assholes of themselves. Whatever. Still had a nice time.
We also hiked the Barred Owl Trail, which wasn’t a great hike except for the small knob of pine forest we came to. That was beautiful, and worth the price of admission (free).
We looked at Six Pine Campground, and got the hell out of there immediately. What six pines? The only people there were workers tearing down trees. I didn’t see any pine trees there. In fact, it was just a circle of grass. If you want to camp there, go ahead. It looked horrid.
We high-​tailed it to South Lake Campground and weren’t impressed with the RV Parking Lot sites. We did find a tiny loop off to the side and grabbed a site on the end. For $ 10 and not too many people there in Springtime, it was worth it. Free showers! I’m sure this would be hell on earth to camp at in summer, unless you love screaming children and assholes blasting that fucking imbecile Toby Keith’s ‘music.’ Not for me, chums. Since I’m used to camping for free in national forest and such, it was a bit of a bummer.
This park is a gem in Iowa, which is mainly farmland and not much else. Oh, and don’t expect to see any trash cans anywhere. Pack your shit out, B.
I dug it. If I ever drive to California again, I’ll stop here for a pit-​stop. And Iowans are much nicer than Illinois people. They actually may say ‘Hi!’ to you on the trails.

We camped here on a recent road trip and the park really impressed me with its scope and beauty. The area is really scenic and the park boasts many different types of terrain and levels. There are ridges and ravines, valleys and peaks. It looked to be excellent for hiking. The campgrounds are nice and spacious and there are many, many campsites. I really enjoyed my stay here and could see coming back to Backbone to explore it more. I believe it is Iowa’s first state park and there are many things to check out, including a seasonal CCC museum.

I loved Backbone immensely when I went here. We camped in a beautiful camping place that did not have any nasty bugs only the beautiful fireflies that filled the air and the forest nearby. It had a great little lake nearby with a stone tower which made the whole area very scenic! Since then I heard it may have fell down during some very devastating floods a few years ago in the area. I hope it is not true, there was no evidence to back up this claim but sad to hear all the same. There were great little streams to cool off in, great hiking in amongst the rocks and small caves. The whole park really was just gorgeous. While I am from Colorado I found those fireflies to be so exotic since we don’t have any out there but on the flip side the humidity was very oppressive so if you are a wuss like me when it comes to humidity like that that Iowa is known for you might want to go in the fall when the humidity is not so overwhelming.