What's There Now

Congaree National Park Visitor Center - Just inside the main entrance to the park on National Park Drive, the Visitor Center includes interpretation, National Park and Volunteer Ranger tours, facilities, a picnic grove, including covered, surround the parking lot, as well as exhibits and a seventeen minute film. A park shop is also included.

Trail after trail after trail. The most popular, either self-guided or by a Ranger Guided group, is the Boardwalk Trail. It is 2.4 miles long. Other trails include the Firefly Trail, and Longleaf Trails near the Visitor Center. Traveling further into the Wilderness, and you encounter the Sims Trail, Weston Lake Trail, Oakridge Trail, Kingsnake Trail, and the River Trail.

There are two locations to dip your kayak or canoe into Cedar Creek that cuts through the park; the nearest is South Cedar Creek Canoe landing on South Cedar Creek Road, a few miles east of the National Park Road entrance on Old Bluff Road. The second is off Route 601 in the eastern section of the park, the Bates Bridge Boat Landing. Now there you will be kayaking the Congaree. The Congaree River forms the southern edge of the park itself.

Photo above: Wayside and cut of a huge fallen tree in the picnic area near the parking lot and outside the Visitor Center, 2025, America's Best History.

Directions

Congaree National Park is located southeast of Columbia, South Carolina, and west of Sumter. There is only one road here which basically spans the northern side of the park, with a few exceptions, including the road to the kayak site. The address for the Visitor Center is 100 National Park Road, Hopkins, SC 29061.

Lodging and Camping

Lodging - There is no lodging in the park, but plenty in Columbia and Sumter, South Carolina.

Camping - There are two regular campsites, Longfellow and Bluff, and three group campsites. None of these is large, so plan ahead, and all three must be accessed from a parking lot a half mile east of the Visitor Center. These are carry in, carry out campsites. No car or RV camping is allowed. The walk to Longleaf and the group sites is short. Backcountry camping is allowed, but you must give several days notice.

Image above: Sign to the campsites as well as Visitor Center along main road into Congaree National Park, 2025, America's Best History.

Official Souvenirs

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History

During the Revolution, General Francis "Swamp Fox" Marion, with the British surrounding the area but afraid to wade into the deep swamp, hid in Congaree between battles of the American Revolution in South Carolina. Although the photo above shows him offering dinner to a British officer, it seems somewhat unlikely that he did that. Marion enlisted in the Continental Army during 1780 and 1781. He engaged in guerrilla and maneuver warfare, not engaging in the major battles, but creating havoc in the Battle of Sullivan's Island, Siege of Savannah, Siege of Charleston, Battle of Black Mingo, Battle of Tearcoat Swamp, Siege of Fort Watson, Siege of Fort Motte, and the Battle of Eutaw Springs.

During the Civil War, escaped slaves from plantations that surrounded the Congaree Swamp, made camp inside the rising and falling waters of the Congaree floodplain, where it would be difficult to find them, or even search for their whereabouts.

The Santee River Cypress Logging Company began to log the cypress trees beginning in 1898. It was a difficult job, but contained thousands of board feet of lumber in each tree. Try imagining cutting through those thick trunks with a back and forth log saw or an axe. Logging continued until 1914.

Photo above: Drawing of the swamp encampment of General Francis Marion, of South Carolina, offering dinner to a British Officer, 1876, Currier and Ives. Courtesy Library of Congress.