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.

Village Creek SP and Shangri La Gardens

Spring break road trip stop #2!
We pulled into Village Creek around 5:30pm.  It is just north of Beaumont and right on Village Creek.  This is not a big park and your choices for camping are the water/electric loop, which was over run with shoeless kids on bikes, Christmas lights and smokers full of brisket, and the walk-in river sites, which have 2 porta-potties and are 100-750 yards down a hiking trail from the parking lot.  So of course we chose the walk-in sites!  And I am so glad we did because the sites were quiet, spacious and private.  We brought a cart and managed to get everything to the site in three 1/2 miles trips.  We got site #8 with a nice view of the river and a water spigot close by.  There are "real" bathrooms by the RV loop with nice showers.  We stayed 2 nights at this park.  On our first morning the view of the creek was beautiful with the mist rising in the cold.  After breakfast we got showered and ready to go to Shangri La Gardens in Orange.  It was a 45 minute drive into Orange.  The Gardens were amazing!  After a tasty lunch as the cafe, we met Maxine the Barred Owl.  Patrick was in love.  We took an hour boat ride through the swamp area and saw alligators, an osprey, and lots of turtles.  We visited the children's garden and the heron nesting area.  The azaleas were in full bloom and very impressive.  It was a wonderful place to visit and the weather was perfect.  We headed back to Village Creek for our last night.  The next morning we packed up and went hiking to find the geo cache.  This park is most known for canoeing and paddling.  The park does not rent canoes, but there are several outfitters that do in the area listed on the state park website.  There is a swimming area about 1.5 miles down the trail, but it was a little to chilly for swimming and the river is very brown.  If you have your own kayak this is a great park to bring it to.