Overall we thoroughly enjoyed our stay at Myrtle Beach State Park and would definitely return if we were in the area.  In addition to the campground, the State Park has a Nature Center, a Visitor Center, free fishing pier, a Gift Shop at the Pier, Picnic Tables and Shelters, a shoreline boardwalk, numerous bathhouses along the beach and equestrian trails. In addition to the campground there are 6 cabins which can be rented. The campground is within easy walking distance (5 minutes) of the beach and fishing pier.

The heavily wooded campground is a very clean and well maintained with over 300 campsites but only 54 have full hookups (water, 30/50 amp, sewer) while others just have water and electric. The sites are all back ins and many are fairly large and well spaced with lots of trees and shrubs to provide privacy. Sites are dirt or sand so in bad weather they tend to be muddy. As with any state, regional or county park, alcohol is technically not allowed.

Rates here are very reasonable for the area and typical of many state parks. Compare to the notably higher adjacent (and in our opinion less desirable) private parks. Senior discounts are available only to South Carolina residents.

Roads are paved and are one way and can be narrow in spots. Some sites will be difficult to back in for larger rigs due to trees and angle of site. All campsites have picnic tables and fire pits. When someone leaves, a volunteer comes to the site and cleans any debris that has been left.

There was a small dumpster and several recycle bins across the street from our site.  The dumpsters are emptied regularly.  Also directly across from us was a bath house which looked fairly new and was very clean inside.

There is a small grocery store at the registration office where basic supplies and wood can be purchased. The staff here is friendly and helpful.  On arrival we asked about having mail and packages sent here.  We were told that it would be delivered to the Visitor Center where we could pick it up, but the Park Ranger delivered it to our door on two separate nights.

There is an International Airport in Myrtle Beach not too far from the campground so you do have some noise of planes and helicopters flying overhead.  Reviews that we found on the State Park were pretty favorable although some people were complaining about the air traffic noise.   During the week, the planes were fairly infrequent so we didn’t find it disturbing at all.  On the weekend, the air traffic picked up slightly. Since our boat and summer RV spot are in the flight path of the “Providence, RI” TF Green airport, it just seemed like home to us.

On our first site #207 by pure luck we were able to pick up one satellite (110) via our rooftop DISH network Trav’ler sat dish.  For local OTA channels, we could only get ABC, NBC and FOX (no CBS) via our standard Winegard Sensar crank-up. On site #209, we couldn’t pick up any satellites until Rob set up the tripod mounted DISH which allowed him to aim through a hole in the trees and get the 119 satellite. The tree cover was so dense here there was no chance for us on either site to get the much higher elevation Dish Network Eastern Arc satellites (61/72/77). Access from other sites within the park could be better or worse depending on the specific tree cover at each location, but we observed plenty of dish setups here.

We had very strong Verizon 4G service. The campground has free WiFi but only near the office, we didn’t even bother trying since our 20GB Millenicom Hotspot plan (on Verizon) works so well. 20GB/mo seems to be just about right for us with both of us online often and all the photo and other upload/downloading we do.

For us, we by far prefer this State Park to any of the other directly adjacent and higher priced private parks in this section of Myrtle Beach. Here you can have a natural shaded setting and still be just a few minutes walk from a beautiful stretch of beach plus easy access to all the other glitz Myrtle Beach has to offer. The sites at the private parks are designed to cram as many rigs in as possible, mostly have zero shade, no privacy and just didn’t appeal to us at all – for example see the photo right of one of the better areas at Ocean Lakes Resort. We can imagine that these parks must get very zoo like during busy times.

The campground itself is about a mile in from the main drag (South Kings Highway) via a heavily treed but paved road. A mirror tag gets your tow vehicle past the general entrance fee collection station, but if there is a line there you have to wait, there is no bypass lane.

We are 43′ and had no trouble maneuvering within the park although there are tight spots and some sites will require more skill than others to back into. I would say a 45 footer could fit in here (and we did see one) but will have to carefully choose their site. Our site #209 would be good for such a rig as it is steeply angled to the road.

Note that on the way out of the park as you approach South Kings Highway there is a big old tree steeply angled over the roadway – keep well left here as other tall rigs have left their mark on the tree – there is a marker post in the road as a reminder.