O'Neil Park, Orange County, California

Entrance to O'Neill Park

Drive down any Southern California freeway you'd think that with all the housing tracts and shopping malls there wouldn't be a wild, or even natural, space left in all of Los Angeles and Orange Counties. Thankfully, that's not so, and O'Neil Park is proof.

You follow a narrow, winding road in to the park, passing rolling hills dotted with patches of prickly pear, eucalyptus and graceful old live oak trees. The park itself is old, surrounded by a beautiful stone wall, with stone pillars and brass plaques at the entrances.
The land was donated by the O'Neil family in 1948, and then they donated additional acreage later, so the various group, individual and equestrian camping areas have evolved over time into a very comfortable retreat.

Our campsite

The campground lies parallel to the broad and deep Trabuco Creek* bed, with the base of the Santa Ana mountains providing a scenic backdrop. The hills are covered with cactus, brush and trees, and make a picturesque setting for the old sycamore, pine and oak trees in the campground.  There are walking trails everywhere.
*Named when a Spanish explorer lost his "trabuco" (musket) somewhere along the creek.

We've met up with friends here, and the guys spent a full morning problem analyzing and doctoring our hitch jack, which decided to go belly-up a couple of days ago. 'Guess after better than 9,000 miles and almost 6 months on the road it shouldn't be a surprise that something breaks. Steve checked into replacement parts, but they wouldn't arrive before we have to leave SoCal to return to TX, so they patched it up and we'll do a permanent repair when we get back to the ranch.

This is a really pleasant park for walking or just play enjoying the scenery. Large trees provide welcome shade in hot weather, but may cause some concern for big rigs. We watched a large motorcoach slowly navigate his way out of a site yesterday. He made it, but there wasn't much room to spare! The sites here don't have services, though there is water available at several spots around the campground. There's also an RV dump on site.

Trabuco Creek after the rain

This particular stop is mostly devoted to a reunionwith families we haven't seen for several years, so time to explore will be limited. It's a good place to keep in mind for future visits, as it's not crowded at all, and there's plenty to explore. It is a good thing we had activities planned for indoors, as by our second day here the rain started. The creek bed was completely dry when we arrive, but after the downpour it was looking more like a real creek

O'Neil Park maps and brochures here