Lake Chicot State Park is on the northwest shore of Lake Chicot, near Lake Village in Chicot County. At twenty miles long, the lake is the largest natural lake in Arkansas and the largest oxbow lake in North America, left behind when the Mississippi River changed its course hundreds of years ago. The park sits near one of the largest bird flyways in the country, and anglers fish it year round for bass, catfish, crappie and bream.
The lake has had hard times. Early in the twentieth century Lake Village drank its water untreated, but a flood in 1916 polluted it, levee work from 1920 added to the damage, and silt and pesticides washed in through the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. In 1948 the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission built an earthen dam to shield the upper fourth of the lake from the runoff of Connerly Bayou. Water quality improved, and in 1957 Chicot County residents donated land on the northwest shore for the park. A pumping plant installed in 1985 diverts silt to the Mississippi.
The park has 14 cabins and 78 campsites, a visitor center open daily from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., fishing piers, hiking trails, a seasonal pool and a store with a marina. Programs include lake tours and Civil War history, and the park hosts a blues festival in June and a gospel festival in September.
The closest stops worth working into your route