Rippling River Resort

When the campground calls itself a resort, what does that mean? While sometimes it's just to sound fancy, in this case I was surprised by how large the campground is. It didn't feel busy, nor was it crowded, just...bigger than I expected in Marquette.

This is mountain bike heaven. Stay here at night, ride trails during the day, enjoy the campground bar in the evening. We aren't mountain bikers, so we ran a trail to Mt. Marquette for a great view.

We didn't use the pool or hot tub. The hot tub is open year-round for the skiing crowd.

The bathrooms, at least in the full hook up area, were different in that the showers each contained a toilet and sink, so the dedicated bathrooms are small (one toilet in the men's). Coin-op laundry, and you can buy quarters with a credit card on site.

The wifi was the best I had on the trip.

When we first arrived we saw the turn into the campground and thought things might be tight for us. You have to watch the signs on entry or you could find yourself in the primitive spaces or where a trailer shouldn’t be.

Most sites are back in, but there are plenty that can accommodate a big rig like our 40’ fifth wheel. Some sites have a bit of slope to them but most were basically level gravel sites. There are many cabins and tent spaces. It appears they are equipped to meet the needs of snowmobilers as well as summertime tourists.

The wifi is fairly solid through the park. It did drop out a couple of times but we were able to stream over it. Weekends have organized activities. There is a nice pool and hot tub. Many trails which I appreciated for walking our dog.

Only improvements I would like would be to have a fenced dog area and more accessible trash dumpsters. The dumpsters were by the dump station which was a quarter mile walk up hill.

We stayed an additional night as we liked it so well. Easy to mountain bike from the campground. We liked the spots, very level. There is a nice store/pizza/bar for drinks to take to the pool or hot tub. on Thursday nights there was music under the gazebo by the river, so nice. Great experience. (couldn't remember the exact nightly rate).

We camped in the upper loop which is more wooded and sites more spread out; upper loop is electric only and it has a bathhouse. Based on the number of mountain bikes I saw, there appears to be an expansive trail system here. We used this as basecamp for a 40 mile road cycling loop. Friendly staff, live music on some nights, and a bar. They also have free wifi which was pretty decent.

We spent 5 nights

Nice campground
Clean facilities (bath, shower & laundry)
Big enough site with Just enough privacy
Loved having the Carp river behind us and the beautiful hardwood trees changing color.
The beer garden was handy when we needed a convenient break on a rainy day
Loved being able to ride/hike from our site to some of the best trails the UP has to offer
Also enjoyed being minutes from downtown Marquette
Staff was friendly and actively present. Someone was always cleaning, taking the trash or grading the road.

Did not love the road noise but it’s not enough to stop us from returning...
Just know there are trucks and you will hear them
Wood was $$$ I would suggest sourcing elsewhere off site
Our site (#8) had some drainage issues which meant we were fighting mud our entire stay. Hopefully in time the drainage issues will be addressed.

We look forward to returning next year

Really pretty setting and our site was right on the river so could hear it at night. Cool lobby with little bar area and gift shop.

Only down side right now is the dirt pads - it rained a lot prior so very muddy. This is a newer campground so likely will add paved or concrete pads in the future that will help. If no rain wouldn’t be as bad but with dogs or kids the camper would be a mess

We will return as the location is great and love being on the river

The woodsy setting is nice. We were lucky enough to have shade most of the day. We enjoyed the walks in the woods with the dogs. It's a vacation location, hence the price, so quite a lot of kids and we were probably the only people who were still working.

We were able to level ok, but the sewer was in one of those ridiculous places behind the RV and slightly uphill. I have a Wastemaster sewer pipe that is permanently attached to the RV and stretches 22ft. I went 1 year without ever having to attach an extension to it and then this is the 3rd one this year. Please, please, please fix this! I looked at a couple of other sites and theirs were fine. There were several other big rig sites that we would not have been able to level on. I noticed another 45' RV with the drive and tag axles of the ground! I might stay here again, but I'd want to check with them that it is level and doesn't have a dumb sewer location.

Plenty of food and shopping options in the area. The ATV's were able to leave from the park and head out into the woods.

AT&T was our saviour on the signal and gave 20/5 Mbps. T-Mobile had nothing and Verizon was weak. The campground WiFi was 2/1 Mbps when we arrived, but fell to almost nothing later - ok for emails, but not worth using for anything else.