Sun Retreats Crystal River

This is a very large park with a lot of full time residents. Everyone was very friendly. The park is full of trees and most spaces are very large, which I loved. We started out in site 170 but realized during the first day that the site was right off of the main road that goes in and out of the park, so there were constantly cars driving by. With 2 little kids, that didn’t work for us, so we asked to move. Staff was very accommodating, and we moved to 180 which was SO much better!

The downside to this park is that several of the washers and dryers were out of order, and they did renovations on the pool almost the entire week we stayed (which we weren’t aware of ahead of time) so we only got to use it a few times.

I work from home and was able to use my AT&T hotspot just fine.

Crystal River, FL – Rock Crusher Canyon RV Park
This is a huge campground with about 400 sites. Some are seasonal and some are park models, but most are for short time campers. It has gated access. There is a large clubhouse, a covered pool and hot tub, dog run, horseshoes, shuffle board, playground, laundry facilities and restrooms with showers. There are lots of wooded areas and although the camp sites are not that far apart, the foliage helps with a sense of distancing. Our site #103 is a back in and is located way in the back of the park; it has some road noise during the daytime but it isn’t bad. Our site is dirt and grass and has a picnic table. All the sites have picnic tables; the Elite sites have pavers or concrete areas and some have storage buildings. The cable channels work well, so we did not even try to set up our portable Dish. Both ATT and Verizon cell signals work. The Wifi here works slowly and only part of the time depending on the time of day – they do offer upgrades if you want to pay for it but we have a Verizon MiFi so we are using that. The campground is not too far out of the town of Crystal Springs so it is a convenient to visit the state parks, the river, and all the manatee areas. We would stay here again.

Rock Crusher Canyon is a large RV park that can accommodate late rigs. Ours is 28’ and we were probably on of the smallest RVs here. The park has many trees and even more bushes, which give it a “state park” feel, which I like. I've noticed that some sites ate fully paved with pavers and others (like ours are dirt) Our site is wide and flat. That said, we’re parked next to a trailer that has not been moved or attended to for quite some time. I certainly don't mind staying next to a permanent resident, but I don't like stairing at a trailer that's in this state of disrepair.

We stayed here in late January to be close to downtown Crystal River for manatee viewing and were pleasantly surprised by how wooded and beautiful this campground was. All the sites are on grass/sand with full hookups and are relatively close together, but there's enough foliage that some sites have great privacy.

A big, beautiful screened-in heated pool and hot tub that we used every day, a little fenced-in dog run, shuffleboard, horseshoes, playground, and lots of daily scheduled activities for those who are so inclined. Those amenities made it worth the slightly higher rate than surrounding parks.

The staff were helpful but not overly friendly and very busy this time of year with all the sites full, so they were deflecting lots of upset calls and people who showed up with no reservations. We might have just caught them at a bad time. We called the day of and lucked into a reservation for 4 days, but it's smart to plan ahead for this time of year.

Less than 10 minutes' drive to launching points for water activities, Three Sisters Springs for manatee viewing, groceries, and other shopping. Go to Crystal River Kayak Company for rentals and a launching point to paddle out to the springs - great people, well cared for equipment, a nice dock, and affordable. An unforgettable experience seeing dozens of manatees in the wild up close.

Poor cell service here with no booster used, but the free wi-fi was surprisingly fast at 2 MBps down, and consistent all four days. They have a good network of access points around the park with strong signals, even without a wi-fi boosting antenna.