The Corps of Engineers has Lake Springs Day Use Area listed as closed for repairs, and that closure was still in force in the Savannah District's seasonal recreation notice dated September 2, 2026. Damage from Hurricane Helene in September 2024 put much of the park out of service and no reopening date has been published. Two things at Lake Springs stayed open through all of it: the boat ramp, and the Deer Run section at the south end of the peninsula, which the Corps keeps open year round including its beach, picnic tables and group shelter. The Squirrel Nest section went to partial closure on September 8, 2026. Before driving out, call the Thurmond Lake project office at 800-533-3478 or 864-333-1100 and ask what is open that week, because the Corps reopens these parks piece by piece rather than all at once.

Lake Springs sits on a wooded peninsula in Columbia County, Georgia, at the end of Lake Springs Road about four miles north of the Savannah River crossing on US 221, roughly twenty minutes from Augusta. The water is J. Strom Thurmond Lake, which is the federal name. Georgia signage and people on the Georgia shore call the same reservoir Clarks Hill Lake, so both names turn up for one place. It is the largest Corps reservoir east of the Mississippi, 70,000 acres of water behind Thurmond Dam on the Savannah River, with over 1,000 miles of shoreline. Full pool is 330 feet. The lake draws down through late summer and fall, which widens the sand and exposes red clay bank above the waterline.

The Corps charges a day use fee at the gate, and the published numbers do not agree with each other. Recreation.gov's park overview says $5 per vehicle while an active notice on the same page says $7. Either way it is a credit card machine ahead of the gatehouse, no cash accepted, and America the Beautiful and USACE annual passes are honored. Park hours are 8 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. unless you are actively fishing or launching a boat.

When the park is running normally it has four reservable group shelters with water and electrical hookups, flush and vault toilets, drinking water, a boat ramp with a courtesy dock, a fish cleaning station, a fishing pier, a playground, a lookout tower, and a long string of small swim beaches spread down the shoreline instead of one large one. Swim beaches other than Deer Run normally close after Labor Day and reopen in late April. The 1.8 mile Lake Springs Loop circles the park, and a trailhead for the Corps' 27 mile Bartram Trail is here, though the Bartram trailheads are also on the repair closure list. Glass and pets are not allowed on the designated swimming beaches and alcohol is prohibited parkwide.

There is no campground at Lake Springs. The park is day use only, and its only bookable inventory is the four picnic shelters: Deer Run, Squirrel Nest, Mallard Point and Pine Point. Several travel directories list it as a campground, which it has never been. Corps campgrounds on this lake are separate parks, among them Petersburg, Ridge Road, Winfield, Hawe Creek and Bussey Point.