Raccoon Creek State Park

I visited Raccoon Creek State Park for a day hike this past Sat. with CM. Given that I’d never visited this park before and that I’d heard good things about its offerings, I was eager to check it out. The pleasant spring weather in Pittsburgh spurred us to pay a visit, since this type of weather is very transient, and you have to get out and enjoy it while you can.
Upon arriving at the park, we parked by the welcome center, which unfortunately isn’t open during the weekends at this time of year, but which did offer well-​maintained bathrooms. Upon picking up and perusing a trail map at the trailhead, we decided to cross Rt. 18 and hike along the Lake Trail, which circles around the lake. I expected this to be a fairly easy and brief hike, but it ended up taking longer than expected due to a couple of reasons. The first is that, at the time of our visit, the trail was flooded in several of the lower areas along the shore of the lake. This meant that we had to either navigate them like an obstacle course with rocks and branches, or bushwhack our way around them. The second is that the map was rather deceitful concerning the dam area – the dam can’t be crossed, and must be navigated around using either the Forest Trail (where the bridge was out, due to flooding!) or the road.
One thing to know is that, aside from the lake beach area, which we reached towards the end of our hike, there aren’t really any places along this trail that afford a good spot to enjoy a picnic. There also aren’t any bathrooms aside from the ones at the welcome center and the lake beach, and one or two port-​a-​potties near the far end of the lake. Along the lake shore, the path is pretty flat, but it does curve up on the hillside for a couple of miles, making for some ups and downs. Overall, however, if the path hadn’t been flooded, it would have offered the relaxing, low-​key hike I was seeking.
Despite the flooding and the unexpected extra length of the path, CM and I had an enjoyable hike. Towards the end, as we became weary and didn’t want to risk getting our feet wet (again!), we opted to take the road, rather than risk encountering more flooded areas along another trail skirting the lake. While I’d recommend Raccoon Creek State Park as a great place for a day hike, I’d advise being mindful of recent rainfall to avoid encountering flooded paths, like we did. 3.5 stars.

I hiked here for about three hours a few weeks back. It was fairly well marked and easy to navigate trails wise.
Only one big timber blocking a trail not surprising with the winter we had this year but I do hope they clear it up! I am going with three stars because its quite a small park, but it looks easily accessible and has camping, ice fishing activities.
In some areas they do not monitor ice thickness for safety during winter so be careful!
Nothing exceptionally beautiful nature wise here but its alright.

love this place. alot to do. the big sandy beach is crowded on weekends, so we left park and drove down road a couple miles to the wildflower reserve really neat place with hiking trails. not crowded. (no dogs allowed in flower reserve). becareful u dont get lost because it would be easy. we walked about ½ mile to lookout point then walked down to creek and swam cuz it was about 4 feet and it was a hot day. clear clean water. saw beautiful bluish green with black wings damselflies. super pretty. lots of birds and minnows etc… to look at. p. s. bigfoot has been sighted near here. bring a picnic cuz the nearby town is super small and no where to eat.

What a BEAUTIFUL state we live in – Pennsylvania is amazing and you don’t have to travel far out of Pittsburgh to get in on some of that beautiful great outdoors action!
Raccoon Creek park would be an excellent place to camp if you have small kids and don’t know how to camp. The park offers something for EVERYONE – excellent hiking trails, fishing, canoing, paddle bikes (so fun!), swimming, camping… And many of the activities are FREE.
Think how much you average vacation would cost for a family of four and consider this, for about $ 25 a night, you could spend a day on a beach (lake) swimming, playing volley ball, then come back to a camp site and cook out, then go canoing and hiking the next morning.
Even for just a day trip, it’s pretty rad. We took our enormous puppy up to Raccoon Creek and taught him how to swim and had fun jumping off the docks into the lake w him, and then went hiking.
The campgrounds…
Here’s the thing: the website does not have pictures of the campsites and some of the sites that we thought were going to be fantastic were pretty crappy. I hiked through all of the campsites yesterday and picked my favorite three out. I’m not going to tell you which sites they were… well, message me and I’ll tell you… they were in the F circle. The campsites in the C loop were also nice, all close to the bathrooms, and level. In fact if I went camping w a baby, I’d go to the C loop bc of the close proximity to the bathrooms, all of which include changing tables. The F and C loop camping sites are pet friendly.
There are showers, water, and dish washing facilties as well.
I am planning an amazing staycation week here the last week of July, and I hope to see you there!
OK – I just decided, I can’t not say which sites are the best. Sites F5, F2, and F6 are really nice. Level, but with F5 the site is big and you can move your tent back in the woods a bit more.
Also, I say this is a good campe site if you’re family has never gone camping before and you’re nervous to see how it goes for the following reasons:
1. There are bathrooms and showers. No tantrums over outhouses.
2. There’s LOTS of stuff for wee ones to do, including a pretty rad play ground that… I may or may not have tested out myself. Kristen tested… it’s pretty fun!
3. It’s LOW COMMITMENT. Maybe your kids get in a brawl and you threaten to take them home right now, and then they don’t stop fighting so you have to take them home… maybe you can get your fire started and just burned all the hotdogs… maybe you spot a raccoon and freak out bc you are outdoorsy in the sense you like being drunk on patios… The park is only 30 min outside of Pittsburgh. You can drive to restaurants, or easily drive home.

Being from the Carnegie area, this is the SP my family would travel to most often throughout life. I have spent many, many days there. It’s easy to drive through it and misjudge the possibilities. There are sooo many fishing access points, picnic spots, trails, a wildflower reserve and heck even the choices for camping are outstanding– 2 sets of Cabins, Group Tent, Group Barracks, Hike-​In and a regular drive in campground that is huge, easily over 100 spots.
I recently spent 3 days/​2 nights in the campground and if I didn’t have to work this weekend, I would still be there. It’s super clean, well maintained, the camp hosts are friendly and there was a lot of empty spots, so I picked a great one with no neighbors in sight and I could still see the top of the bathrooms. My site was big, like 80×50. It had shade and sunny spots. There was the standard picnic table and fire ring. Let’s take a moment to talk about the bathrooms. These are brick and mortar buildings that have 2 sink areas outside for washing dishes and the like. The inside is a generic state park bathroom. Clean, clean, clean. This place was clean, if I didn’t mention that. The shower area was also clean and big enough that you didn’t feel cramped. Hot water, warm water, cold water, you pick.
It’s a great, close, SP to do your shakedown trip to make sure you have everything before the big camping trip. The other nice thing about camping here is that if you forget something, you can just drive home and get it. I live a half hour away. Or you can just pop over to Robinson to Gander Mountain, WalMart or REI and re-​provision.
For day trips I like to go early for some kayaking and fishing in the well stocked 100 acre lake. It’s an electric motor only lake, but most people out on it are paddling anyways.
Then you go hiking on one of the many trails of varying difficulty. Then you go swimming in the beach area. This beach is under used, I recommend a swim here if you visit the park and it’s open. You’ll more than likely have it to yourself or there’ll be 50 kids. No in between, ha.
The staff is always nice, the grounds are well maintained and they have a lot of programs going on weekly. Why are all those bees suddenly gone? Find out July 18^th when Sir Henry Penobscot hosts South Western Pennsylvania’s Natural Apiary Science in the Amphitheater (jk, there is no Penobscot, but there is a bee program with an observation hive). Check the website or look on the boards posted at the bathrooms for actual dates.
Frankly, you would have to try to have a hard time here. I can’t think of any reason to take a star away. Maybe because I’ve never seen an eagle there even tho there’s a sign purporting to be one? Nah. It’s a great place for a couple hours or a couple days. Please, go out there and enjoy it.
Oh, and I forgot to mention: This park is pet friendly, even the campground!

Even though I was with 50 kids and a handful of adults, I still had a wonderful time. I couldn’t have asked for a more scenic and peaceful atmosphere.
I was a little apprehensive about swimming because no one really likes lake water. However, it was the perfect temperature and I didn’t want to stop swimming. (My sunburn is proof of that!) There are nice picnic-​type areas to eat that are completely surrounded by trees. There’s also a grill so cookouts are definitely a must. I would definitely recommend stocking up on ice cold water because the water fountains there aren’t thirst quenching and a bit on the disgusting side.
I wasn’t able to venture over to the concession stand, but apparently they serve awesome food.
The one downfall was the volleyball area. Apparently there were flies mating in the sand and well, gross. I made sure my group kept enough distance from it, but I was looking forward to some «beach» volleyball minus the soft porn.
RCSP was wonderful and I hope to return again minus 50 kids.

Where do I begin about Raccoon Creek State Park? It’s simple. It’s a beautiful park only 30 – 40 minutes outside of the city. You have access too a lake with a beach, plenty of water activities such as kayaking, fishing, and more. There are trails, and if you loop 3 of the longest together, you can make it a weekend and backpack along the trail, including two camp areas for backpackers. It’s also a very dog-​friendly park, and there are certain loops of the general campground that allows them. The best part is that you will never see or do all of this park in one visit. Since it’s such a versatile outdoor space (hiking, camping, boating, swimming, etc.), it truly is a year-​round park. I absolutely love it here and you can’t beat the convenience.