Bike Trails Paths Near Me in Lakehills

Rising From the Ashes

For more than 70 years, folks have visited Bastrop State Park to enjoy its history and marvel at the Lost Pines. Forest fires and floods have ravaged the park in recent years. Now comes rebirth: new trees, new plants and new life. Come see the park’s recovery from nature’s fury. We’re just 32 miles east of Austin.

Things to Do
Bring your family out to the park! You can camp, picnic, swim, ride bikes, hike, fish, geocache, take in a nature program, and look for wildlife.

Stay overnight at a campsite or historic cabin. Campsites range from walk-in tent sites to full hookup RV sites. Bring a group to stay at our group barracks (with group hall, dorms and space for tents).

Hike seven miles of trail. Explore the growing forest, look for the new generation of loblolly pines, and witness the resilience of nature.

Swim at our pool, open May to September. Read through our swimming safety tips before you come.

Bike or drive scenic Park Road 1C between Bastrop and Buescher state parks. The hilly 12-mile road takes you through recovering and forested areas of the Lost Pines. Turn down the radio and enjoy this quiet drive. Share the road! The speed limit is 30 miles per hour.

Fish in the ½-acre Lake Mina. We lend fishing equipment, and you do not need a license to fish from shore in a state park.

There is a place in Far West Texas where night skies are dark as coal and rivers carve temple-like canyons in ancient limestone. Here, at the end of the road, hundreds of bird species take refuge in a solitary mountain range surrounded by weather-beaten desert. Tenacious cactus bloom in sublime southwestern sun, and diversity of species is the best in the country. This magical place is Big Bend.

Big Bend Ranch State Park is Texas’ largest state park, at over 300,000 acres. It extends along the Rio Grande from southeast of Presidio to near Lajitas, in both Brewster and Presidio counties. Just a stone’s throw from Mexico to the south, the park is in an area so remote and rugged that it has been called El Despoblado, or “The Uninhabited.” In spite of that name, this awe-inspiring region boasts a rich human history.

George A. Howard bought a few tracts of land in the Bofecillos highlands in 1905 to add to his nearby uplands property. This became the Chillicothe-Saucita Ranch. The Bogel brothers—Gus, Gallie, Graves and Edward—began buying small ranches, including Howard’s ranch, in the 1910s. The buildings and corrals of their headquarters, Saucita, endure today at the heart of Big Bend Ranch State Park.

Hit hard by a drought and the Great Depression, the Bogels sold their 38,000-acre ranch to Manny and Edwin Fowlkes in 1934. The Fowlkes increased their holdings to near 300,000 acres, adding fences, stone dams and water pipelines. But the 1950s drought and a global wool market crash forced them to sell.

In 1958, Len G. “Tuffy” McCormick bought the ranch, listed as one of the 15 largest ranches in the United States and described as half the size of Rhode Island. Among other improvements, McCormick gave an easement for the river access road to the Texas Highway Department. That road is now the scenic Camino del Rio.

Subsequent owner Robert O. Anderson bought the ranch in 1969. He became, as owner of the Diamond A Cattle Company, the largest private landholder in the United States. In the 1980s, he partnered with Walter Mischer to market the ranch as a private hunting preserve.

Thanks to the efforts of individuals and groups involved in land conservation, TPWD purchased the ranch in 1988. The park opened on a limited basis in 1991. It opened fully to the public in 2007.