Time for a bit of “fall” camping. We call it “fall” because it is the end of October but it is still quite warm in Arizona and along the Colorado River. We departed Phoenix and headed west towards the Colorado River. We passed through Wickenburg with no issues.
We continued for what we thought would be a short drive. It wasn’t long before a state trooper stopped us along the highway. He came up to our RV and told us there was a vehicle in the ditch and they needed to stop all traffic so the tow truck could retrieve it. He said it wouldn’t take long. We were the first in line and it wasn’t long until the line up of vehicles behind us grew and grew. It took well over an hour for the vehicle to be retrieved from the ditch. In the meantime, the weather was beautiful and everyone was out of their cars standing around chatting and watching. If it had been stinking hot then that would be a different story.
After an hour or two we were on our way heading through Love, Hope, and on to Parker. It delayed our arrival at the campground by a few hours but we were safe and the people in the accident were safe so all is well.
We finally made it to River Island State Park. The park is very popular in the fall, winter, and spring and luckily we had made reservations many, many months ago for our favorite site.
Campground: River Island State Park
Location: About 12 miles north of Parker, Arizona along the east side of the Colorado River
Site: 23– pull thru
Cost: $30.80
Services: E (50AMP), W
Comments: A lovely small campground along the Colorado River. Our site was an end site with nice views and nice space. The campground does sit between some mountains with limited cell phone reception. Starlink works great and there is some local WiFi in the area.
The campground has 37 sites all with water and electric. There is a dump station near the entrance. Eight of the sites are right along the river/beach and are for tents or small campers. Those sites have great views but you are basically camped right next to each other in some grass so there is very little site privacy. The remaining 29 sites are level, large, and long.
There is a cove along the river with a sandy beach which is perfect for boating, swimming, fishing, or just hanging around. There are birds all around with the Vermillion Flycatcher being quite prominent. We heard owls at night. We did not hear the burros but other times here we could hear the burros braying from across the river.
There are a few shorter trails in the state park which take you up the hill for some nice views back over the river.
The park also has a dog run area, a desert garden, and a boat launch.
We noticed an Alfa parked two sites over from us and they had a sticker on their vehicle “Roaming with Rosie”, Jamie and Linda. We contacted them and spent a lovely evening getting to know them. We owned an Alfa for 10 years so we feel a connection with other Alfa owners. It turns out we know many of the same people. It was a fun time. Check out their You Tube channel!
It is a lovely state park and about a 10 minute drive back south into Parker for grocery stores. It isn’t far to the turn off to Cienega Springs Rd to head to the infamous Desert Bar. AND there are a variety of restaurants along the river nearby. AND we see that there is a new section of RV sites for the state park being constructed across the street next to the River Island Market. We aren’t sure when it is scheduled for completion but it will add quite a few more sites.
On to some day hikes in the nearby areas.
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