By:
Submission
From off Hwy 34, go south off 34 on 330th Ave.
It’s a great little backpacking area, nice forested rolling hills in southern Iowa. We had the place to ourselves on Thursday night in the last weekend of May but by Friday and Saturday the parking lot was filling up. Spent two nights at White Oak camp and found plenty of good firewood, heard owls and coyotes, and did some bird watching. Tons and tons of different types of bugs so if you’re scared of spiders, I wouldn’t recommend. Also lots of ticks and I can imagine plenty of mosquitoes in the summer months. Hike was easy enough, trail was sloppy after a couple of days of rain but dried out in the sun. If you’re in Des Moines or surrounding area and looking for a quick getaway, check this spot out.
My son and I did a hike in the Woodburn unit for a primitive camp. The fall day was beautiful and would highly recommend going in fall it did get cold at night. We stayed at the black oak campsite and we saw and heard tons of wildlife. There were a lot of cows in the area which we heard throughout the night. Beautiful wooded forest and looks like it's being kept in good care. The stars....lord have mercy!
