4th of July PA Weekend Trip

[NoHeels]

Hello everyone!!

We are hoping to do a weekend trip coming up Thursday - Friday starting on 4th of July. We were planning on hiking from Swatara State Park to 183, staying at William Penn Shelter and Hertlein campsites. We are tent campers, so I am a little worried about the shelter and camping area being really crowded with no tent sites available. Is anyone familiar with this area? Do you think we will be able to find tent sites at each of those locations on Thursday and Friday nights, respectively? Any other ideas or tips for this small section??

Thank you so much!!

NoHeels

[Gambit McCrae]

Hello everyone!!

We are hoping to do a weekend trip coming up Thursday - Friday starting on 4th of July. We were planning on hiking from Swatara State Park to 183, staying at William Penn Shelter and Hertlein campsites. We are tent campers, so I am a little worried about the shelter and camping area being really crowded with no tent sites available. Is anyone familiar with this area? Do you think we will be able to find tent sites at each of those locations on Thursday and Friday nights, respectively? Any other ideas or tips for this small section??

Thank you so much!!

NoHeels
Forget about the shelter/ campsite locations. There are so many tenting opportunities in PA I did Duncannon to NJ without using any shelter locations for nightly stops. Don't worry about where to camp it wont be a problem. Just look out for the rattlesnakes and copperheads.

I was going to do 115 miles of PA last July 4th but the rattlesnakes and copperheads were so bad last year that i rescheduled for late October and had a perfect week of nice cool weather and no snakes lol

[NoHeels]

Thanks Gambit! I didn’t realize you could camp most anywhere in that area. I’ll keep an eye out for the snakes! 😬

[Gambit McCrae]

Thanks Gambit! I didn’t realize you could camp most anywhere in that area. I’ll keep an eye out for the snakes! 

If you look on guthooks there are campsites littered all around, and there are even more that arent on there. only suggestion would be to be paying attention to watersources prior to the camp you choose as most all (99%) of these little tent sites will not have water.

[Slo-go'en]

If you look on guthooks there are campsites littered all around, and there are even more that arent on there. only suggestion would be to be paying attention to watersources prior to the camp you choose as most all (99%) of these little tent sites will not have water.

Actually, if you don't see it listed in Guthook forget it. This time of year the poison ivy is everywhere and thorny bushes cover the ground. To say nothing of the increased risk of picking up a tick when you start crashing around in the bush.

But it does look like there are a lot of campsites along that stretch. None of them looked very inviting to me when I went by this spring, but I'm fussy. Most were small and of course miles from any water.

I didn't like the looks of the William Penn shelter, but there's a few tent sites on top of the ridge.
If you find the place I tented, I pulled a bunch of pointy rocks out of the ground so they wouldn't stick into my back. No good tenting at the shelter, it's on the side of the ridge and is pretty steep. This is suppose to be a popular shelter, so expect it to be crowded and all the good tent sites gone.

The Hertlein campsite is fairly large, but it could fill up too.

[Game Warden]

Also, Guthook doesn't tell you that if you violate the camping regulations on PA state game lands, you WILL get a citation. Trust me, I know. Take a minute to read the regulation signs we post.

[mankind117]

I would go some of the other 1000's of miles of backpacking trails PA has on state forest land:
https://www.kta-hike.org/major-trails-and-find-a-club.html
https://www.dcnr.pa.gov/Recreation/WhatToDo/Hiking/StateForestHikingTrails/Pages/default.aspx

You won't have to worry about finding a campsite or where you can camp as you can camp anywhere really on state forest land. Plus if you go further north to the Allegheny Plateau it will be cooler.