Budget vacations at Wesson's Lake Lincoln

Special to Wesson News

With the cost of family vacations away from home busting budgets, many locals are rediscovering Lake Lincoln State Park as an alternative to travel outside the area, say park officials.

Park manager Cindy Durr says increasing numbers of people from the surrounding area are coming back with their families to what was once a playground for them growing up, but long since forgotten.

“More and more, we’re hearing people say ‘I forgot about this place,’ ‘I haven’t been here for 30 years,’ or ‘I didn’t think we could afford a family vacation this year,’” says Durr.

This year, Lake Lincoln State Park is expecting to draw up to 16,000 visitors to the Wesson area.

Lake Lincoln State Park, if you don’t recall, is nestled in the shade of towering hardwood trees in the northeast corner of Lincoln County in close proximity to Interstate 55, U.S. Highway 51 and State Highway 27.

Lincoln County opened the 1000-acre facility in 1984 as a watershed lake area to control flooding of streams in its northeastern sector, and the State of Mississippi took it over in 1996.  It is now the third most used park in the state system, and it ranks in the top 25 among 4,000 parks and campgrounds nationally for water recreation, picnic areas, beaches, fishing, bird-watching, camping, and being “kid-friendly,” according to a Reserve America survey a few years ago.

The park’s major feature is its 550-acre lake stocked with bream, large-mouth and striped bass, crappie, white perch, and catfish for fishermen who come year-round, and which offers a 1 ½-acre swimming beach and sections for boating and water and jet skiing. 

There are also nature trails for hiking, volleyball sand courts, playgrounds with swings and other equipment for kids, a 200-foot walk bridge where fishermen cast their lines, picnic areas with grills, tables, shelters and two group pavilions; two rebuilt fishing piers, a water skiing pier, a boat dock, laundry facilities, bath houses and the Magnolia Arbor chapel for worship services and weddings, as well as camping and lodging options.  There is even an 18-hole disk golf course where players hurl frisbees towards baskets, rather than hit small balls towards holes.

A few miles away on the Co-Lin campus in Wesson, people into real golf can find an 18-hole public course, and within a few minutes drive, there are hunting grounds at wildlife management areas, antique shopping and a variety of restaurants.

Since the park sits in a valley, it has promoted itself as a great place to unplug because cell phone and internet service is problematic,. but connecting with civilization, if you really want to do it, is one of another off-premises amenity,  At Uncle Ray’s, just across from the park’s entrance on Sunset Road, you can find a good cellular phone signal and set up a computer to get email, while picking up needed camping supplies, including food and snacks; buying bait for fishing adventures, taking out meals or sitting down for lunches and dinners. 

The park has, increasingly, produced special events for visitors, with a new Friends of the Park (FOP) group helping develop and implement new ones.  On July 4, when the park has traditionally encouraged celebrations, FOP this year sold hamburgers and hot dogs to picnickers.  New events on the park calendar are a fall fest carnival, BINGO nights and planting Christmas memory trees.  A Mardi Gras parade, Halloween trick-or-treat for children and an Easter egg hunt are  special events that have become a tradition in recent years, and an antique car show and flea market are future possibilities.

Visitors can stay in a one bedroom cabin ($86.50 per day) or three cottages – a pair with two bedrooms ($101.65 per day on weekends) and one with three bedrooms ($111.35 per day on weekends), and camp on 150 sites with electricity ($23 per night/$33 per night on weekends and holidays), 90 sites with no power ($16 per night/$22 per nights on weekends and holidays) and 31 primitive sites for tents ($12 per night).  Weekday rates for the cottages are 40 percent less.

Other park rates are:

• Day use : $2 per person per day (under five years old no charge).  $6 for special events. 

• Fishing:  $5 per person per day (16–64 years old)/$7 with skiing boat, $3 per person per day for disabled and seniors/$6 with skiing boat.

• Disk golf:  $3 per person per day.

• Small pavilions suitable for 60 persons: $48.15 per day plus entrance fee.

• Large pavilions for 100-150 persons:  $58.85 per day plus entrance fee.