San Angelo State Park

We stayed in several Texas state parks in June and July. We bought a yearly pass that gave us a discount on entrance fees and camping sites for all Texas state parks. The sites normally have only water and electric hookups, but a dump station is provided. Since we were only staying a few days at a time in each park, it worked out well for us and saved us money on campgrounds.

San Angelo State Park

Near San Angelo, Texas, is San Angelo State Park. It has wide open views, a lake and a herd of bison. While we were there, we enjoyed the evening sunsets.

Colorado City State Park

Colorado City State Park is less than two hours north of San Angelo. It is situated on a lake also. We had a nice pull-through site which made it easy to get in and out. It is a dark sky park, so I tried a few night-time photos. The Milky Way was really bright.

Caprock Canyons State Park and Trailway

Caprock Canyons State Park and Trailway was one of my favorite parks. It is located in the lower middle part of the Texas panhandle. It has a nice visitor’s center at the entrance. It is home to the official Texas bison herd. It is the only herd in the U.S. that hasn’t been interbred with cattle. They have some impressive bison that have run of the entire park.

The babies were abundant and fun to watch.

The bison liked to hang out in a grassy area near the campsites, but didn’t seem to bother anyone. They also had a lake of their own where they gathered in the evenings.

Caprock Canyon State Park is located in a beautiful red rock canyon that reminded me of Sedona, Arizona.

There’s a scenic drive through the canyon to various scenic areas.

Besides the bison, we saw other wildlife: prairie dogs, a rabbit and a roadrunner carrying something in his mouth.

The prairie dogs didn’t seem to mind the bison resting near their homes.

Growing near the roads were many wild sunflowers.

Another feature of this park is the system of rails-to-trails throughout the park. Rails-to-trails is a program that turns old railways into hiking, biking and horseback riding trails. This trailway spans three counties, has 46 bridges and a tunnel that is home to thousands of bats. We didn’t hike the trails since the weather was too hot and we were only there a couple of days.

Palo Duro Canyon State Park

Called the “Grand Canyon of Texas”, Palo Duro Canyon state park is located at the bottom of a deep canyon. As we approached the park, we saw only flat land until we were practically right at the road going down into the canyon. At the top of the canyon is a nice Visitors’ Center.

From the look out at the Visitors’ Center

The road down into the canyon was narrow, steep and windy. Using lower gears was a must. Once down in the canyon, it was very lush green with lots of trees. The creek runs through the canyon. When it rains, it frequently floods the road in areas. We were glad that there were no storms while we were there, since we did not want to get stuck. There’s only one road in and out of the canyon.

The red rock canyon walls contrasted beautifully with the green trees and bushes.

There are places where the rocks looked like they are only held up by dirt. It looked like they could come tumbling down at any moment.

The last of the late spring flowers were blooming. This is Texas Thistle, I believe. It was everywhere.

One nice thing about camping in state parks is that you can get closer to nature. This was the view across from our campsite. Some of the campers hiked up this rock formation. It was very hot, so we just enjoyed the view instead.

This was the view of our campsite.

We’re very glad to have discovered the Texas state park system. It’s a way to have affordable and scenic campsites when we have to travel across the big state of Texas.

One of our favorite Texas towns to visit was San Angelo. We stayed in San Angelo State Park Campground where we had some great views of the evening sunsets.

The weather was fickle with cloudy skies in the morning and rain and thunderstorms in the afternoons with clearing in between.

We sometimes went for walks in the evenings.

This part of Texas is dry and cactus, especially prickly pear, thrive.

One evening we drove to a lookout in the park where we could see for miles.

We drove into San Angelo to see some sites. Ray wanted to see the telephone museum located at Fort Concho, an historical fort established in 1867 to protect the frontier settlements. Fort Concho is now a National Historic Landmark, so I was able to get a stamp for my National Parks Passport book.

The museum has on display a unit designed and made by Alexander Graham Bell. There were only five made and only two in existence today.

Unit designed and made by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876.

Old phones from Museum of Telephony in San Angelo, Texas

San Angelo is known for their historic murals depicting the history of the area. We went on a search to find as many as we could. The first one we saw was near the Train Museum and depot. It was about all the forms of transportation used throughout their history.

Four murals capture the history of transportation.

Up closer, they look like this.

Stagecoach was a form of transportation in the early days.

The Iron Horse was a vast improvement for transporting goods and people to the west.

The airplane made the vast Texas distances seem much smaller.

One of the things we were told to look for were sheep. They are decorated and found all around town. This one was at the Train Museum and Depot. We wanted to see the train museum, but we were on a mission to find the murals. We decided to save it for another time.

Most of the murals are found near the old downtown area of San Angelo. Since they are painted on the sides of buildings in parking lots, sometimes it was hard to get a clear photo of them. This one is of a local author who writes westerns about the Texas Rangers. His name is Elmer Kelton. I have not read any of his novels, but they sound interesting.

I stumbled across the Blacksmith mural while looking for another mural. This is right across the street from the famous Eggemeyer’s General Store. While taking a photo of Eggemeyer’s from across the street, I came upon another sheep!

This store has so much in it, it could take hours to see it all. I liked the Indian with the lollipops in his headdress.

There were all kinds of candies, chocolates, sweets, jewelry, household goods, teapots, teacups, knickknacks, vintage signs, vintage toys, aprons, hand towels, kitchen items, bandanas, cards, stationery, and even an old car in the men’s section.

The best thing about living in a travel trailer is that you’re not tempted to buy anything because you don’t have room. The worst thing about living in a travel trailer is that you can’t buy anything because you don’t have room.

I enjoyed just looking at all the kitchen items.

I collect photos of street clocks. Here on this same corner was a street clock.

We wanted to find some more murals, and to my surprise, I found three more on the opposite street corner. These three were together and depicted the military history of the area. Ray was stationed in San Angelo for training at Goodfellow Air Force Base. He had a five and a half month long advanced electronic repair training.

San Angelo Army Air Field was only used from 1942-1945 for training bombardiers for combat missions. It was closed after WWII and today is a civil airfield called Mathis Field.

Fort Concho, as mentioned earlier, was a fort established to protect frontier settlers. William “Pecos Bill” Shafter commanded here along with other notables. Also, the 9th and 10th Cavalry Regiments and 24th and 25th Infantry Regiments were all black soldier units known as the Buffalo Soldiers.

Here’s a closer look at some of the details.

By now, we were hot and tired. We managed to find one more mural. This one was not mentioned on the website list of murals. I call it the Dry Goods Mural. There were two or three more that we missed or couldn’t find.

There were many more things we would have liked to see, but there just wasn’t time and energy for them.

We did, however, drive into town to see Lone Wolf Bridge in the evening. It was supposedly lit up at night, but though we stayed for awhile after sunset, we never saw any lights. It looks like a hangout for taggers. The bridge is covered with graffiti, It’s a sketchy area at night. So we left.

You can read about this historic bridge below.

If you ever get to San Angelo, there are lots of things to see. The top of my list is the water lily gardens and the murals. And don’t forget to take a picture of a sheep! They are all over town.

For a photo tour of sheep and their “ewe”-nique names, click on this link:

https://www.downtownsanangelo.com/sheep-gallery

Travel USA

Our Airstream Travels

Tag Archives: San Angelo State Park

Texas State Parks