Martin Dies Jr. State Park

Spring break road trip stop #3!  Wow this has taken me a lot longer to get finished than I intended.  I hope it is worth the wait.  Our last stop on our tour of east Texas was Jasper.  Yes I know, banjos and other things that make Jasper famous in Texas.  But, it is really pretty there and totally worth the trip.
Martin Dies Jr. State Park is on the shore of the B.A. Steinhagen Reservoir.  The park is split into two units.  Walnut Ridge unit has RV sites and some screened shelters.  The nature center is also in this unit.  More about that in a minute.  We stayed in the Hen House unit which has water only tent sites, RV sites, and screened shelters.  This is also the same side as the headquarters and canoe rentals.
We were in site 75 which had large trees and plenty of shade.  This also helped create a good wind break from the lake.  The lake sites have very little shade and wind protection. We enjoyed a bike ride around the loop and watched the sunset across the lake.  We saw lots of birds, especially cardinals.  That night we had a raccoon and a couple armadillos visit us.  No food lost!  Saturday we did a lot of bike riding all over the park, fishing, and went hiking to find the geocache.  One of the trails even had baby alligators sunning nearby.  It was a wonderful relaxing day.  The next morning we packed up and went to the nature center for an 11am reptile program.  The kids loved the nature center and all of the fun things to touch.  We got to see corn snakes eating mice up close and touch the snake.  We got to touch an alligator skull and skin.  We learned that alligators love the smell of wet dog.  So if you let your dog swim in a lake or river with gators, within 20 minutes the gators will show up.  So keep your dog out of the swimming area!  Then the kids got to hold a baby gator.  They loved it!
This is a park I would definitely return to.  It is about 4 hours drive from the Austin area, but if you have kayaks or a boat, love to fish, or bike you will enjoy this park.