Park Features
At Charlestown, you’ll find a boat ramp with access to the Ohio River. There's fishing in the river and along 14 Mile Creek. The park also has an extremely popular campsite with 132 electric sites, including 60 full hookups. Jill Duvall, the Friends group member I interviewed, loves camping at Charlestown, and she’s even a local. Jill recommended camping there during Kentucky Derby weekend and said you’ll find plenty of Derby parties happening.
The park also has a new hiking challenge. The Trail Challenge will take you on every trail in the park for a total of 16.3 miles. These trails are intense. You’ll hike up hills, into valleys, between large boulders, spot a waterfall, and see evidence of the park’s military past. The challenge is a major task, but thankfully, it doesn’t have to be done all in one day. My favorite part of it is the hike through Rose Island, an abandoned amusement park.
Rose Island: Indiana’s Ghost Town
Rose Island is an abandoned amusement park accessed by crossing the Portersville Bridge. Trail 3’s incredibly steep paved downhill path takes you to the bridge. (If you go on a guided tour, there’s a van to drive you back up the hill!) Crossing the bridge transports you back in time. On the other side of the bridge, the “Rose Island” sign arches, welcoming you to the past. It's the initial reason I was excited to visit Charlestown.
I'd seen pictures of the park, a ghost town hidden in the woods. Now I was seeing it in person. I wandered down a crushed path lined with stone pillars, metal arches gracefully connecting them. I climbed down a rusted ladder into the partially filled-in swimming pool. I spotted the remains of an intricate fountain. All around me were interpretive panels and audio clips to explain what once had been.
The park’s interpretive naturalist Jeremy Beavin gave me the history. He said, “Rose Island has definitely become quite an attraction, something that we've invested in a good bit. That site was a summer resort opened in the 1880s by a company that actually operated steamboats… It was basically just a picnic ground along the river.” The park was originally called Fern Grove, but in 1905, Fountain Ferry Park opened in Louisville. It was a true amusement park, so people weren't headed to Fern Grove as often. Eventually, the park went up for sale.
A businessman from Louisville named David Rose bought the park in the 1920s. He redeveloped the park into a resort with a small hotel. Jeremy continued, “People would come and they would stay. They built cabins. He added the swimming pool, a small roller coaster, a carousel. All these things really make it a place that you would come and you would stay. He opens it in 1923 under the name Rose Island.” Is it really an island? No. But David Rose knew marketing and advertised the resort as an exotic, secluded destination.
Unfortunately, everything changed after the stock market crash in the 1920s. Rose Island went from having about 135,000 visitors a year to barely making it. Then, a major flood in 1937 covered the entire resort, and Rose Island never recovered. Later, the military bought the land and used the area for an ammunition plant. Jeremy said, “After the military took over the land, anything metal from the rides to the walkway arches was drug out, loaded on barges, shipped off, and melted down to make war machines. Everything else was left behind.” The stone pillars, arches, and foundations were all that was left.
Even the Rose Island sign you see when you cross the Portersville Bridge today is not the real sign or in its original location. Jeremy told me, “The real sign originally spanned three stone pillars along the Ohio River, the place where the ferry from Louisville dropped off the visitors. It remains a mystery what happened to the original.” With pieces of the resort missing, the park staff have had to become very creative storytellers with Rose Island. The interpretive signs are some of the best I’ve seen at a park, and the audio players also enhance the story of Rose Island. It makes it easy to imagine families splashing in the pool, teenagers falling in love, or kids screaming on the roller coaster.
Rose Island is a haunting and beautiful place to hike. Going with a naturalist would be the best way to experience the history. Jeremy said, “I always tell people to hike that trail and read all those signs, listen to all those stories, and then come back on a guided tour. Because we're going to tell you a whole other chapter of the story!” Hiking Trail 7 through Rose Island is really a surreal experience. No matter what time of year you go, you'll be able to get some incredible pictures in this ghost town resort.
Planning Your Visit
If you want an amazing staycation, I’d recommend a weekend of hiking, then some fossil discovery at neighboring Falls of the Ohio State Park. If you can visit Charlestown for a Rose Island guided hike, you’ll get all the best stories and lore! I was told the best places to eat in Charlestown include Copper Kettle and Charlestown Pizza Company where apparently you have to try the mashed potato pie – one of its signature pizzas.
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