A beautiful day to be out in the woods. I love trails that are within 30 minutes of Madison. This…read morespot is great and free for hiking. I enjoy the doing the 3 mile blue trail loop. If you're looking for longer combine with other trails or make shorter. They also have an area where your dog may be off leash. Most of the trail is shaded with some open sunny areas. The trail is generally not busy...another reason I love it.

Great place to take medium to larger dogs. There is ample space for them to run. The woods offers…read moreexcitement for them and the lake side is a great place for them to cool off on warm days. This is the best dog park we have ever used. There is a fee for those out of town folks who may wish to run their 4 legged friend. All the dog owners we have encountered are great. This is the place to socialize your dog, do not keep them on a leash because they can feel trapped when meeting other dogs. The dogs figure out how to relate to each other. The only mark against this place are the walkers who don't have dogs who choose to walk thru the park. They seem to be annoyed that dogs run up to them. I don't care because they have acres and acres of amazing paths in the woods to trek, the dogs only have this one smaller place. I say if you don't like dogs then don't walk thru THEIR part of the park!

Awesome experience being surrounded by the beauty of the upper dells! Only wish there was more to…read morehike and that is accessible by cars and not just via a boat ride.

stunning such a nice informational ride out there beautiful walk. Would recommend for all agesread more

Went back to one of my favorite state parks & that is Governor Dodge State Park. And this was the…read more3rd time hiking at this state park. We hiked on Meadow Valley, Lost Canyon, Woodland & Cave Trail

Every year my family goes on a big camping trip, and this year we visited Governor Dodge! A first…read morefor us. Looking back, I'd say overall it was A-OK. We booked a double site as we had two RVs and multiple tents. It sure was plenty spacious! However, we all had noted it would have been great to see photos of the site when booking so we could know more that to expect. It was 100% full sun, and truly not chance for shade. Most other sites at this park had lots of tree coverage, which we would have loved and likely swapped to giving the chance. Being in a wide open space in the dead of summer can be tricky. The grounds are massive and well-kept, with tons of great hiking trails. Overall stunning views and vast green spaces. There's two large lakes with options to kayak, canoe, fish, ,etc. Concession stand with tasty ice cream, and a handful of convenience-store type items. Oh and we also definitely enjoyed the playground area with the kiddos. On the bad side: the shower-houses were pretty terrible. At least the one nearest to our site. It was to the point that half of us chose to forego showering all together just to avoid it. We also had a bummer experience at one of the beaches. We arrived around 10am and were all swimming for a few hours (along with tons of other visitors), when the rangers arrived and promptly closed the beach due to dangerous water bacteria. The closing wasn't the issue, but instead allowing 50+ folks to swim and fish in it before doing so. We'd all wished this water testing was done before the beach 'opened' for the day, as it left us fairly nervous having the quickly be rushed out. Overall, plenty of positives to this gorgeous state park - we made some great camping memories! Just hope those few shared pieces of feedback could help for future plans/changes.

We skipped Devil's Lake for our end of summer camping and opted for Mirror Lake instead; it was…read moresuch a great experience! Definitely best way to beat the crowds and relax at a quieter campground before the hype of the school year starts up. While the sites look and feel the same as the ones at Devil's Lake, there are far fewer sites and it is much more peaceful. The sites themselves are really well kept. Our little site was still able to fit three cars in the driveway, two full tents and a sunshade.The campground features a massive field, covered family Pavillion and little playground. Really nice way to burn off some energy away from the sites if you're not hiking or sit and have lunch at one if the many picnic tables. Two grills available as well. You can't get better camping showers than I've experienced outside of Mirror Lake! They're all private entrances and have a seperate area behind a partition to put your bag/towel/clothes with a bench. Great hot water and pressure. Seperate bathroom area that is extremely well maintained too. Huge plus! While there aren't a lot of trails, the hiking isn't at all strenuous and has beautiful views of the rock formations along the way. Sturdy walking shoes still required. Personally I wouldn't swim in the water as its a little murkier, although it is so lovely to venture around. You're able to rent kayaks for the best experiences it seems so we'll be doing that next year! I highly recommend taking a break from life at Mirror Lake for camping and relaxed hiking! Can't wait to go back.

We rented kayaks on Mira Lake. It was one of the most beautiful kayaking trips we've taken. We did…read moreit an early fall, and it was absolutely perfect. The scenery is beautiful. The water was calm. And there weren't a lot of other people kayaking at the time. Highly recommend if you're in the Dells area.

This is a great find half an hour from Madison. The park has a variety of trails through woods,…read moreprairie and along the lake. Most of them are loops so you can do as short a hike as you want or add several loops together and spend a few hours. They are also decently hilly so that's fun too. My favorite trail runs along the lake, great views! Be cautious though, the narrow trail through the woods does border a steep decline to the lake. It's worth it though, great views!! The other nice thing about this park (at least when I've been there) is that there aren't very many people around so it's easy to hike around and barely see anyone else. Some of the trails bump up against neighborhoods so that's interesting, emerging from the woods into a prairie and then seeing houses. Must be nice to have this park as your back yard though! Dogs are allowed in this park, on leash of course. There are garbage cans near the parking lot and a small beach area. Also near the parking lot is a playground and a shelter with a number of picnic tables. Definitely worth the drive. We will be back!

5.14.24 - Great park with playground, beach, ducks, covered picnic area, benches along the hike,…read morerest shelters, clean restroom.

Driving up, i could see bald eagles flying. You can see them even better through the free…read moretelescope. And if you visit on the weekends, a guide will tell you where even more eagles are if there aren't enough for you here when you visit. They also have bus tours that go around to all the local hot spots. What a great way to see these wild animals. So much better than a zoo.

BIG fan of this state park! Recently returned for a camping trip after not having been here in…read moreyears, and boy was it delightful. The campgrounds themselves are well-kept and honestly massive. Can't even imagine how many campsites they have. Ours in particular was in quite the open space with tons of grass, but there are plenty of options that are more wood-like and covered. Nice they have electric hook up options, as we were traveling with both tents and RVs. Hiking trails were awesome too, wow. Really enjoyed our excursions out and about, winding through the woods, rocky up-hills, and taking in the beautiful lake views. Also awesome? The beach and the attached gift shop/restaurant. Super duper well-kept. Tons of beach space (though it was still packed!) with clean sand and shallow waters, great for the kiddos. Also that gift shop is more of a convenience store- it's got it all! The adject ice cream shop was also enjoyed by everyone we traveled with. My only small gripe was the lack of garbage cans. I feel like this is some kind of state-park rule maybe? I don't know there was only one area with dumpsters and unless you trek over there, you're kind SOL with wrappers, ice cream cups, rubbish left over from your restaurant meal, etc. 100% will return here, whether it's for future camping, just hiking outings, or beach days.

Came here for a weekend in October and was pleasantly surprised by just how pretty this park is!…read moreThe fall leaves definitely helped but I'm sure it'd be gorgeous year round. We camped at Upper Ice Age campground and it was perfect - the sites are spread out so you're not too close to neighbors and there are two bathrooms and water stations that make it easy to do your business. The bathroom located in UIA could be cleaner but the showers and bathrooms right down the hill are great and not too far away.

Absolutely breathtaking hike. It is a relatively easy hike to take. There are many beautiful spots…read moreto take pictures if you are into photography, or just wade into the water. If you are in Baraboo and at Devils Lake, this is not to be missed.

It's a great place to go hiking and to take a dip in the natural reserve water nestled between to…read morerock cliffs where you can use the rope to swing into the warm flowing river water. It is a very cool place to check out and really was a great start to the trip. Also do not jump off the rocks into the water because there are rangers who watch that area and it is not allowed to jump off the cliffs.

Easy parking, beautiful hike. Not too long or strenuous but can be slippery. Absolutely worth it…read more Have the best memories here with my dad!

Highly recommend hiking here!…read more There is a small parking lot. It helps to come early otherwise you may have to find parking somewhere else. We noticed cars just parking on the side of the county road. After you park you have to pay for a ticket and stick it on your dashboard. This ticket will also get you into Devil's Lake which is awesome so you don't have to pay for both. Right by the parking lot they have some area/trail/hiking information as well as bathrooms. This is the start for 2 different trailheads. You can go right for the Parfey's Glen State Natural Area or you can go left on part of the Ice Age trail. We decided to do both with our dogs. We first did the Ice Age trail which was a narrow wooded trail. Beautiful with a good amount of uphill. We did about 3 miles out and back. We could have gone much farther. It was so nice, we only saw 2 other people on the trail. Then we went over and did about a mile in Parfey's Glen. Everyone we saw in the parking lot seemed to do Parfey's Glen, it wasn't too crowded late morning but we saw a good amount of people. Lot of families so definitely a kid friendly hike. It was such a nice hike, it starts on a paved path and then goes to gravel, and then dirt. Along the way there are streams (that you have to cross so bring your hiking boots or shoes you don't care about). Towards the end I believe there is a waterfall but we didn't make it that far with the dogs. I look forward to going back and doing the entire hike.

A rather lame place. Depending on your perspective…read more Visually it's lovely. But as I sat alongside the southernmost (I think I was south) shore in my car eating a hamburger, I spied a sign that contained all the rules of this park. It wasn't precisely a rules menu. It was more along the lines of Do's and Don'ts. Mostly DON'T. No swimming. No dogs. No fishing. No boats. No flotation devises (which I'd already was covered by the first of the commandments.) No littering. (I'm on board with this one) No alcoholic beverages. No overnight parking/camping. No fires. No fireworks Near as I can tell this leaves to fucking reason to call this a park. But possibly it's ok to kill someone, so long as they break any of the listed 10 commandments. I wonder.