Ohio's Geneva State Park occupies a prime stretch of Lake Erie beach and offers visitors plenty of year round fun.
The nearly 700-acre park is great for day-use visitors, and offers overnight visitors the option of enjoying the great outdoors while camping, staying in a fully furnished cabin or enjoying the luxury of staying at a full-service resort lodge.
We stayed in the park's Lodge at Geneva-on-the-Lake during our most recent visit to the park in early October. Beautiful sunny weather, coupled with a more relaxed off-season pace, made it a particularly nice time to leisurely enjoy the park.
We loved the two-mile paved trail running along Lake Erie from the lodge and through the park. My only regret was that I didn't have my bicycle, or time to rent one from the lodge, to ride the trail, although it made for easy and pleasant walking path.
The park also has six additional miles of multi-use trails for hikers, snowmobilers, cross-country skiers and hunters.
The entire length of Geneva State Park runs along the Lake Erie shoreline for about one-and-one-half miles, giving visitors ample access to Lake Erie's central basin.
The season was winding up at the park's marina when we visited, but during the warmer months, its 400-plus slips and docking spaces draw boaters who rent dock space for the season, as well as day-use visitors. Marina amenities also include a six-lane boat ramp, snack bar and concessions for gas and other boating needs.
Fishers know Lake Erie as the Walleye Capital of the World, as well as a good place for fish like yellow perch, steelhead trout, channel catfish, and Coho salmon.
Visitors with mobility issues will find fishing access from a handicapped-accessible sidewalk atop the marina's east breakwater.
The park's waterfront location means it has a long stretch of swimming beach, which includes a 300-foot-long stretch of guarded beach and a bathhouse near a large parking lot. During the off season, you can still enjoy walking along the beach and taking in the expansive Lake Erie view, as we did during our visit.
The park's camping grounds includes 89 sites with electrical access, four full hook-up sites, and seven non-electric sites, along with amenities like showers, flush toilets, and a coin-operated laundry. The campground also allows pets at selected sites.
I thought the park's dozen cabins, which all fronted Lake Erie, looked like an appealing way to stay at the park for a few days. The cabins have fully equipped kitchens, private baths and showers, air-conditioning and heat, a gas grill and screened in porches and decks. They each accommodate four adults or a family of six with a private bedroom and sleeping loft.
The park is about an hour's drive east of Cleveland and just west of downtown Geneva-on-the-Lake with its strip of retro arcades, snack shops, stores and nightclubs that buzzes with activity during the summer months.
Winter brings snowmobilers, cross-country skiers, ice fishers, and hunters to the park.
The park, like a lot of land along Ohio's Lake Erie shoreline, is a good destination for birders, particularly during the spring and fall migrations. Songbirds love the park's wooded areas, while the beach draws a variety of shore birds during those seasons. Late fall and early winter bring more migrant water birds to the park.
Natural areas, especially on the western end of the park and near the middle beach area, host many plants more common to the Atlantic coast and rare to Ohio like sea rocket, while Cowles Creek, No Name Creek and Wheeler Creek host other swamp and submerged aquatic vegetation.
Want to learn more about the village of Geneva-on-the-Lake and the nearby city of Geneva? Check out Geneva (Images of America) by Susan Bradburn.
Thanks to The Lodge at Geneva-on-the-Lake, which provided one night's lodging, dinner, breakfast and the in-room wine package for my review, with no further compensation. I was free to express my own opinion about our stay, and the opinions expressed here are mine.
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