Brazos Bend during Spring Break - Wild Texas Forums: Parks, Travel & Recreation

campermom · 03-21-2008, 08:26 PM

The weather in San Antonio was pretty windy and rainy all day Tuesday. As we left town about 5:45, I was hoping it would be clear there. We arrived about 9:30pm and spoke with the host. The wind was pretty strong and I didn't want a shredded tent again so, the plan was to arrive, claim a site, and go get a motel room for the night. That way they wouldn't give my Wednesday reservation away if I didn't arrive Tuesday. The host suggested I take a shelter for the night since there were a couple vacant. I made sure to get to the office before 9am to claim the shelter for a second night.

We attended the guided Creekside lake hike. My son spotted 2 snakes along the path. That boy has sharp eyes. That would not the the last thing he spotted during the trip. It was nice to see water in the lake. We were there 2 years ago and the lake looked like a pasture. We took a walk around Elm lake and saw 2 large gators sunning themselves on an island. There were many Egrets, Ibis, and Herons. I only saw 2 Roseatte Spoonbills and they were flying so I couldn't get a picture of them. As for the Pileated Woodpecker, the lens on my camera couldn't reach far enough to capture the image.

We hiked around 40 Acre lake and noticed a 6 foot gator in the shallow side of the swamp . My son walked in front of my and several other visitors who were just behind us. He startled a 6 foot gator who was on the grass between the lake and the path. The gator returned the gesture and startled my son by slinging his head around and hissing at him. My son lept across the path. When he landed and took another breath, he hollered "Hey mom, I found one!" Mr. cool thought we all missed him leap in the air with fright. We took many pictures of that gator.

Back at the nature center, we pet the Mexican rat snake, the corn snake and the baby gator. We went for several bike rides, and he played for hours at the playground by the shelters. We had some raccoon issues. We had ridden to the restroom and when we returned, a coon was sitting on my Coleman picking dried up food off the burner. Thanks coon, but ewww, get your muddy feet off my table. Those things were as big as a Javelina! The first night we had the coolers inside the shelter but something, I wonder what, kept messing with the screen all night. The food got locked up in the truck the second night.

There was a family with 3 little girls who arrived about 8pm the second night and were using their outdoor voices, in their shelter UNTIL MIDNIGHT. At first, about 10, I fell asleep easily. We were exhausted from the previous day of work and travel, and raccoon noises all night, not to mention all the hiking and biking we did. Now I can appreciate the sounds of a family and children enjoying time together but it was late. They weren't speaking English or Spanish so I didn't know how to ask them to be quiet, or if they would understand English or not. About 12:15 I said in my OUTSIDE voice, Oh come on and go to sleep already! It got noticeably quiet after that. Guess they understood English. The family was quite cordial upon bumping into them in the restroom in the morning. I don't think they had any clue who they had upset that night. Everyone was real quiet in the morning and we managed to sleep until.........................9:00am! yea baby, I LOVE camping! There were a few thousand birds who tried to ruin our slumber but they failed.

We took our time to break camp. Before leaving the park we asked for directions to Eagle Lake, where Attwater Prairie Chicken National Wildlife Refuge is. The Ranger girl gave great directions and we were greeted by a herd of Buffalo at the entrance. The visitor center had a sign on the door saying they were all "Out in the field" and sorry for the inconvenience. Bummer. Well, their restrooms were spotless. We started to take a hike. 30 yards from the gate on the narrowly mown path were 2 very large snakes, twisted upon each other. They were taking advantage of what they thought was a private stretch of path. They looked like they were......uh.....you know.....makin' snakes. Ok, hike is over. I am not stepping into the tall grass with shorts on to go around snakes. They were rat snakes so not dangerous, but they are very fast and that creeps me out. Back to the truck.

We were near enough to Sealy to visit Stephen F Austin State Park. We went in, took an hour long hike and came across a copperhead. Luckily he was either in a sunbathing induced coma, or was dead. He looked uninjured. He was only about 2 feet long.

We then went to the SFA historic site. While looking at the replica house, we noticed a family hiking along the other side of the fence line. A fence with several signs marked private property, no trespassing. Turns out that is their land and their grandparents run the historic site museum. They saw us on the site and went to the office to gets us brochures and show us a few things. They were just walking their fence line to do repairs. The lady let us take a few photos inside the museum, including a shot with my son and SFA's writing desk. That's sort of cool if you're a history buff. The kids are going to have a TX history unit this next week. He'll be showing his teacher that photo for sure. That was enough excitement to last us until Garner in 2 weeks.

almitra · 03-22-2008, 06:03 PM

Thanks for that review---I love yours and have learned to apreciate them for ther candor and honesty, like others on this site.

Repmac1 · 03-27-2008, 03:10 PM

Spring Break found us a BBST too! We stayed Monday - Friday. Great weather if you like wind. Kite flying while laying on a puddle of grass in a sea of clover blooms on the 'hill' by the nature center was as entertaining as it was relaxing. The wind didn't really stop the wildlife. Lots of good birds, many active alligators and a couple of snakes. After fishing at the Hale Lake pier we climbed on our bikes, started down the road and my daughter spied a dark creature slithering across the parking lot. A 2' Cottonmouth! Pit viper head, dark features. The day before we had attended the Snake talk and were told that most folks call them Water Moccasins, but the snake man said that we were more likely to see them out of the water as opposed to in the water. He was right! She was estatic and could not wait to tell her older brother. We watched it head into grass near the group picnic area. Turns out when her brother left the pier with his new found camping friend they found a very large Rat snake and had it waiting in a box at the campsite (#126) to show his sister. I told them to take it to the nature center but our new found friend said that they would not want it and would tell him to let it go free. He would know, it turns out that this new friend is the Rangers son who lives at the residence in the park and has had lots of opportunities to donate live critters to the center.
Campermom mentioned racoons. They were very active this year. If you plan to camp here make sure you racoon proof your site at dusk. One thing that I learned this year is that coons don't understand English. The guys in site 128 were up most of Wednesday night yelling at them. They would yell, the racoons would depart, and then promtly return. A little bit later they would yell...this went on and on. I wanted to yell at them to shut up, try another language or just get up and put the food in their truck. I couldn't wait to get up early, make a good deal of morning camping noises and get them back for keeping me up most of the night. To my chagrin it was them that made lots of morning noise as they packed up and left as the sun was rising. Enough about racoons.
Lots of water in all areas of the park and it looked like Elm and 40 Acre lake had been hit with herbicide. I have never seen them so clear of vegetation.
Go visit this great park!

jennjaz · 03-27-2008, 06:18 PM

thanks for the reviews. We want to visit there soon.

Are the gators and snakes a safety issue? I have 5 kids, 12.11.8.7.5 years of age. Of course, we watch them at all times, but they enjoyed having free range of our tent site at Inks.

Repmac1 · 03-31-2008, 12:58 PM

Just leave them both alone.
Give the alligators a wide berth when they are up sunning on the trails. The 'trails' are wider than a vehicle so you'll have plenty of room to pass. The snake man at the nature center says that most bites occur when a snake is picked up. Locally, the most recent bite (Mar '08) was from a child running across a playground at a beach park, give any play area a good look before turning the kids loose. Snakes can feel vibrations so maybe everyone stomping their feet a few times while canvasing the area will send them away.

almitra · 03-31-2008, 01:02 PM

Eeks! Scary.