Rifle River Recreation is 4,449 acres located within the AuSable State Forest. The recreation area includes seven lakes, three ponds, seven miles of trout streams, and four separate campgrounds. Since this was our first visit, choosing a campsite was not an easy task! Grousehaven is the only section with electricity, and this is the campground we initially considered. We have a 35' fifth wheel, which is quite tall, sometimes making it difficult to camp in primitive campgrounds with narrower roads and low branches. After a bit more research, I decided we would not have any trouble getting to any of the campgrounds. We reserved site 152, which is a primitive site in Ranch campground, and hoped for the best. When we arrived to check-in, the representative said we had a fabulous site. It is about three miles to Ranch campground from the entrance on a winding dirt road, so it takes a bit of time to get there pulling a trailer.
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| Ranch campsite 152. |
Ranch campsite 152
This site is spacious and grassy; we loved it! I actually thought all of the campsites in Ranch campground were great. The sites that are not on the river were also grassy and somewhat private.
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Ranch campsite 152.
Chairs in the distance are on campsite 153. |
Campgrounds: Grousehaven (electric), Devoe, Ranch, and Spruce (primitive)
We do not mind primitive camping, and we thought
Ranch campground was the best campground of all four.
Spruce campground also has some private campsites and a few on the river; however, the sites in that campground were not as grassy as the ones in Ranch campground. There is a river access area in Ranch and Spruce campgrounds. There are two campsites in
Grousehaven that look like they may have a partial view of Grousehaven Lake in the distance (#21 and #57), although most sites in this campground do not have a view or privacy. Campsite #80 overlooks the road and sanitation station (this is not 100% clear when looking at their website info).
Devoe campground is within walking distance of Devoe Lake and the swimming beach. That is a nice feature, although the campsites in this campground were also more dirt than grass. We did not go through the Devoe campground section that is closest to Jewett Lake, and do not know if any of those sites offer a view of Jewett Lake.
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| Grassy river access point to Rifle River near top left in photo. |
Recreation: hiking, swimming, boating, and more
There is so much to do in this park that we are already planning a longer visit next year. In addition to the
river access points previously mentioned in the campgrounds, there is also river access on Ranch Road near the west end of Devoe Lake. We did not bring our
kayaks this trip, although we plan to next time. It has been a rainy and windy year, and there were signs posted at some of the river access points stating that trees were down across the river.
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Photo taken from bridge over Clear Creek.
Click to enlarge and see trail. |
We
hiked the loop along Rifle River the afternoon we arrived. This trail crosses over the river via a swinging bridge after crossing Clear Creek. Most of this trail is fairly wide and easy. The mileage markers are a bit off, however. The trail map shows less than 2 miles between marker 21 and 23 (1.87 to be exact), and according to my phone GPS, it was actually over 2 miles between these two points. It was an easy 5½ mile hike total from marker 23 to marker 16, and then back to marker 23 via the road after exiting the trail in Spruce campground. You can see more photos from our hike in the Facebook album.
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| Rifle River from swinging bridge. |
There is a one-lane road to the swinging bridge that is gated off shortly after the bridge. The sign said it was a dead end when we started down the road; however, it looked like the road went through on Google maps, so we decided to check it out. There is a
canoe launch site on Sage Road, and we wanted to see whether we could get to it from the park. The road does go through; however, the locked gate makes it a dead end.
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| View from observation tower. |
We drove to the
observation tower, as there is no hiking trail to the tower. The road is one lane and slightly winding and hilly. We drove our truck, and we observed others visit via car with no trouble.
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| Jewett Lake |
We walked to
Jewett Lake during one of our walks. It was quiet and beautiful in the morning.
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| Looking back at the swimming beach from the island on Devoe Lake. |
We took our inflatable dinghy to
Devoe Lake, where there is a boat ramp. Motors are not allowed on any of the lakes in this park, including electric motors. We did not realize this before our visit, and we had planned to spend a few hours slowly motoring on Devoe Lake.
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| Looking toward Weir Road from the island on Devoe Lake. |
Instead of using the boat launch, we inflated our boat at the
beach, and oared to the island instead! Next time, we plan to use our kayaks to paddle the entire lake. There was no one on the island while we were there, and no one arrived before we rowed back to the beach. The
swimming beach on
Devoe Lake is sandy and clean. It was unseasonably warm in Michigan during our September visit, and several people were on the beach when we returned from our boat ride. This beach has picnic tables, a bench, and a couple of shade trees. There are two swimming beaches and a boat launch on
Grousehaven Lake; however, we did not have a chance to visit there.
We did not do any
fishing, although we observed fish jumping, and others who were fishing. The online information for the lakes in this park lists many different fish in all of the lakes. There are four more lakes that we did not have an opportunity to visit. We had planned one more hike our last morning; however, it was rainy and wet the day we departed.
Overall
As I already mentioned, we absolutely love this recreation area and campground! It was definitely worth the almost 3-hour drive, and we hope to visit next year.
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