Buttonwood Campground

I have to say this is one of the cleanest most organized and well taken care of campground I’ve ever been to. I dare you to find a weed in their flowerbed! With that being said I will say that the bath houses were hit or miss. Two out of four visits were disgusting, once there wasn’t any hot water and I was forced to take a cold shower, the remaining two times the bathrooms were immaculate.
I will say however that unless you are traveling with kids or really enjoy nature the town has nothing to offer. The campground did offer bingo for the adults which I enjoyed but for the most part the activities were geared towards children. Pack well because the nearest Walmart is a good distance away. The camp store was well stocked but always extremely busy. The staff were super friendly and always eager to help. Being new to camping we were having some issues hooking up the utilities. A call to the office promptly sent someone down to help us at no charge. I thought that was very thoughtful.
Before booking familiarize yourself with the park layout. The upper level where the store, pool, and children’s play areas are located are very sunny with immature tree plantings. There really is no shade and the camping experience is similar to camping in a field. Across the street river side is more like a campground — they have mature trees and the river is very close. At first we were booked on the upper level but once escorted to our spot (yes, they escort you upon arrival which I thought was a nice perk) and seeing that it was basically a field we paid a small upcharge to move to riverside and did not regret our decision.
I will say that a train runs CONSTANTLY on the other side of the river. It ran more then once an hour and is LOUD. Not a problem for a city slicker like myself but… if you are looking for tranquility maybe booking on the upper side would be better for you.
We did however make the mistake of assuming they had charcoal bbq grills at each site (they do not) as well as easily accessible fishing. We bought a 1 day fishing permit for both of us only to not use it because there was no place to fish from the shore — we asked locals and even traveled to three different nearby towns. Unless you are planning on fishing from a boat or walking out for wade fishing there really isn’t a shore point to fish from.
Up the road a bit they also own Juniata River Adventures which rents canoes, tubes, and kiyaks but no discount is given for campground customers.

We camped here last year, during one of the Halloween weekends. It was quite a lot of fun! They had coffin races and decorating contests. Some folks are pretty serious and set up very elaborate scenes on their campsites. We loved it!
They also had trick or treating for the kids before it got dark. It was nice to meet the other campers and their dogs. Yes, this is a dog friendly park and the pups got in costumes, too.
Maybe this year, they’ll have a costume contest for the dogs, too!
We will be going back. It’s close enough to home for us to run away for the weekend.
PS. yes, there is a train on the other side of the river. We found we didn’t mind it. It came to be rather soothing to us.

I’m not impressed with this campground at all. First of all the campground is on 2 different sides of the road so you have to cross a road to get to the office, playground, pool, etc. There’s also a train right behind the river so you hear that constantly along with the traffic from the road. The pool is way too small for the size of the campground. The sites are right on top of each other and there are not a lot of trees so you are baking in the sun. People were setting off ½ sticks of dynamite but not once did we see security driving around looking for the morons who set it off but at 11:02 pm we were told to turn off our radio that was on low volume to begin with.

One of the best camp grounds we have been to. Kids love it and it is real relaxing for adults. Staff is friendly and facilities are great.