Brazos Bend State Park

My family and I, I mean, I have a goal to visit every state park in the state of Texas. In order to appease my family I told them we would camp… in a shelter. We had never done that before and it made my kids happy. You see my spawn have not taken to the outdoors like I have.

If you are camping in a shelter, it feels like you’re driving to the very back of the park, the road keeps going and going, which is nice because you feel like you’re even further from the city. There’s are 13 screened shelters that are nicely spaced apart. They have a big porch that fits a picnic table, a nice big fire ring, a grill and a water spigot. The inside is spacious at 12 feet X 12 feet, they have a ceiling fan and electricity! We felt like we were glamping! It was easy to fit a queen air mattress and 2 twin mattresses with space to walk around. The bathroom was a short walk away as was a playground.

One of the big draws to Brazos Bend are alligators! We parked at Elm Lake, hiked around to the observation tower. On the way to the tower we saw an alligator! I thought it was spectacular! My husband and kids did not care for the giant beast at all. Sadly we didn’t see anymore.

The observation tower is 3 stories and the view is nice if you want to look at water and swamps.

On a previous trip to Brazos Bend I walked around 40 Acre Lake, the Elm Lake Loop Trail and Old Horseshoe Lake Trail. I saw multiple alligators around Old Horseshoe Lake. I even saw an alligator with a lot of babies on their back, that was a sight!

I noticed there was a good number of bird watchers and photographers around the area between the Elm Lake Loop Trail and the observation tower. I’m no photographer, but I did notice birds that I had never seen before.

The park offers primitive camping, campsites with electricity and water, a dump station, interpretive center, day use facility, overnight group facility, fishing, fishing pier, park store, picnic tables, playgrounds, restrooms, screened shelter, showers, trails for biking/mountain biking/hiking/horses, nature/interpretive trails, and it’s wheelchair accessible.

Overall this State Park is an easy hike. The elevation rarely changes, and the views are nice. The shelters were well maintained and clean. I highly recommend this park.


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The park is very large with a lot of flat gulf coast hiking. The good thing is there is not a lot of difficult hiking here. But, it is largely around looking at swamps and wildlife. They are known for their alligators and birds. You should see plenty of them if you keep an eye out. There are of course precautions to take with alligators as they can be dangerous.

The campsites are nice, but not extremely private. The lack of wooded areas or elevations make the campsites feel more like a parking spot down a road than a hiding spot that you can have your own space in.

The firewood is sold in bundles near the host site. They are in an open shed and charged on the honor system, but you must have cash. We found the wood to be fairly moist and hard to catch, took a couple firestarters and plenty of kindling to get it going.

We stayed in shelter which was nice. It had electricity, an overhead light and, best of all, a ceiling fan. Rather confusing though, the park is pet friendly on a leash, but the shelters said no pets allowed. Seemed odd to leave them out all night leashed to the grill with all the coyote sounds going on.

It was a nice place. The bathrooms were well maintained and had showers. We didn't go to the observatory, but will likely be back to go through more of the hiking.