As you may be aware, Sandy Hook recently opened their campsites to the public. Previously, only scouts and church groups were allowed to use them. You may also be aware that Sandy Hook bans hammocks from being hung on trees. So I walked around Sandy Hook today and checked out the campsites. I wanted to see them before writing to the park superintendent to ask them to reconsider banning hammocks.
Well, looks like I won't be writing the superintendent. There are no trees at the campsites! Each campsite is surrounded by dense underbrush and very few trees. Even if the underbrush were cleared, there's a ton of poison ivy. As mychal recently pointed out, there are some campsites with shelters where you can hang, but most of them are too small to hang a hammock (8 or 9 ft. across).
There are two shelters that are big enough to hang. Unfortunately, each shelter is shared by two campsites - D14 & D15 shares a shelter, as does D18 & D19. The ranger said you'd have to rent the pair of campsites (D14 & D15, for example) in order to hang hammocks in the shelter. If you reserved D14 and nobody had D15, they probably wouldn't mind.
I remember camping with the Scouts at Sandy Hook back in my ground-pounding days and really enjoyed it. Looking at it through a hammocker's eyes, it doesn't look that good. Additionally, the campsites are tightly clustered so you'll be right on top of the people in the next campsite. Of course, as temps get colder, campsites become more deserted (some people don't like cold weather - go figure). Unfortunately, the campsites are only available from May to mid-October.
I give this campsite two thumbs down.
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