Pickwick Landing State Park

Pickwick Landing State Park is approximately 2 hours and 15 minutes from my home in Nashville, and is located in Counce, Tennessee. It has 1,400+ acres, fishing, boating, a marina, 10 cabins, camping, a lodge, a restaurant, a swimming pool, a golf course, a three mile paved trail, three small swimming beaches, an aviary, a butterfly garden, and a visitors center and gift shop. The town surrounding this area was originally called Pickwick, after Dickens' The Pickwick Papers. This was the spot of a riverboat stop in the 1840s. The lake was named Pickwick Lake. During Roosevelt's New Deal, this was the site of a new dam, named Pickwick Dam. The 53 mile long dam was completed in 1938. In 1969, the city was purchased by the state of Tennessee to become a new state park. The state park opened in 1972.

This whole area is gorgeous and has a lot of water recreation, so if you're a fisher or swimmer, this park is for you. There's not much in the way of untamed wilderness, but this park is absolutely chocked full of amenities that's sure to please every member of the family.