Hoosier National Forest / Brown County State Park
Camping in Hoosier National Forest | Hiking in Brown County State Park | Bloomington, IN | May 2024
On the Friday before Memorial Day, we arrived in Hoosier National Forest and headed toward our intended campsite. Because of storms and a long detour around road construction, we arrived a bit later than we would have liked. However, the area was not nearly as full as we had expected it to be, and we were pleasantly surprised by how spread out and quiet everyone in the area was. The campground was the Blackwell Horse Camp, which has an equestrian area but also allows for free dispersed camping around the open grassy area. We chose a spot and got set up for the weekend. We had plenty of food, a little cell signal thanks to our signal booster, and a big loop where Charlotte could lead us around in circles as much as her little heart desired.
We spent the whole day here on Saturday, going for short walks, and one longer one down the forest road to the Brooks Cabin. Curtis attempted to hike one of the trails that started from our campground, but found it to be extremely muddy. We were very comfortable here, and would have been happy to spend the entire weekend in this spot, but the weather had other plans.
The forecast showed severe storms with high winds and tornadoes possible on Sunday night, and after going back and forth on what we should do, we decided to use some of our saved up hotel points and get a room in Bloomington. I wish I weren’t such a coward when it comes to storms, but I also knew that I wouldn’t get any sleep in the van with storms passing through overnight.
With that decision made, we found a few fun things to do on Sunday before the storms moved in. We started the morning with driving over to the Hickory Ridge Lookout Tower. Curtis climbed up the tower for a good view of the surrounding forest, then we went for a short hike on a trail heading North from the tower. While the campsite where we had stayed had been pretty quiet, every trailhead we saw in this section of the national forest had been relatively busy. Still, we enjoyed a quiet hike through the woods for as long as Charlotte wanted. Well, we enjoyed it until Curtis happened to look a little too closely into a root cave and saw FOUR COPPERHEAD SNAKES all curled up together staring right back at him…yikes! That was enough nature for me today!
After that hike, we continued driving West to enter a new county, and took a very round about way to get to Bloomington. On our way, we stopped in Brown County State Park to go for another hike and see another tower. Right when we arrived, the first of today’s storms passed over, so we sat in the van and ate lunch while we waited. Once it had moved on, we got out and went for a short walk on the Friendship Loop Trail. This one was easy and had a scenic lookout, though we couldn’t see much because of the thick fog that had engulfed the area after the rain.
We hung out here until we were able to check in to our hotel, then made our way over to Bloomington. We enjoyed a safe, quiet, and uneventful night there, made dinner in the kitchenette and watched Finding Nemo on TV. And thankfully this was the only time that it stormed for this entire trip!
