Our trip to Brazos Bend State Park… Alligators, turtles and more, oh my!

My husband’s birthday was coming up and we were discussing camping trips. He stated he wanted to go to Brazos Bend State Park for his birthday, about an hour and a half away from us. When I asked him why? He stated he wanted to see alligators! Okay… I guess we’re going to see alligators then.

It’s 2020 and all the state park campgrounds in Texas seem to be all booked on the weekends so we booked 5 nights Sunday thru Thursday in November. The day dawned bright and sunny with the temps in the 70s. Perfect camping weather! We loaded up the critters… 3 cats and a dog, hitched up our horse trailer w/living quarters and set off. We had the GPS in the truck set and Google maps on my phone set up and running–just in case. It was an easy and uneventful drive down to the Park. Well marked and well maintained, the park rangers were friendly and helpful. The park store was even open… they just asked everyone to wear masks and everyone did!

We found our campsite, backed in and plugged in… it was wide enough to fit both our dually and the trailer side-by-side. A picnic table and concrete pad with grill right behind the trailer which worked out perfectly for us. Only downside: we had a tree behind us that had a nest of Japanese Beetles which would fly everywhere when it got hot enough. Ugh.

We walked inside our trailer and realized our Fridge had the dreaded ‘Check’ light on. The entire time we trailered down it ran perfectly on propane but now, plugged into shore power, we now had an issue. We tried resetting the fridge, no luck. Then we noticed the LED lights were going dim. We narrowed down the issue to DC power–which meant the battery. Mike put our portable battery charger on it and things literally brightened up. As soon as he took the charger off it, the lights dimmed back down. The battery was dead or our trailer charger was dead. We figured the battery–cause we knew where the charger was and it’s in a tough spot to get to. So we headed to AutoZone to get a new marine battery–and a flashlight because now it was getting dark. Ha. Figures… Murphy’s Law struck again!

We returned with the new battery, Mike installed it while I held the flashlight (’cause it was dark–and the mosquitos were out!) The fridge and lights went back to their normal brightness. Yay! Back to vacation time!

We did our first hike the next day, on Mike’s birthday, to Elm Lake down the hill from our campsite. (The camping area is up on top of a large flat hill, where the alligators would never want to climb.) Enzo thought we should be hiking our normal pace, not this slow searching mode. With several stops we started to spot an alligator head here and there laying motionless in the water. Then I saw a couple of people way up ahead who were taking photos of something, they had been standing in that spot for quite a while. This park is also known for its water birds–many people bring cameras and binoculars to check them out too. They moved off and we headed up the trail to their old location. We didn’t see anything unusual in that area except that the birds were very quiet and not moving much. Then I spotted the alligator up on the bank of the island out on the lake. He was huge! He was sunning himself in the sun. Wow. We got several photos and checked him out with the telephoto lens. Awesome creature. We saw a few more, but none others out of the water like he was that day. We hiked about 5 miles and saw all sorts of water birds and turtles that day. I was so happy we got to see that huge gator on Mike’s birthday!

We headed back to the trailer, had lunch and hung out by the picnic table in the sun for the rest of the day. Enzo crashed on the rug and we brought the cats out on their leashes to sit on our laps and enjoy the moment too. In the evening, deer came out into the field behind us to nibble in the fading sun. I checked out the map the park rangers gave us to plan the next day’s hike.

We never have any problems getting up when we are on vacation! The next day was also warm and sunny. We decided to go to the George Observatory and check out the Creekfield Interpretive Trail in that area. We hiked down to the observatory, somehow took the wrong trail and wound up going north when we should have been going south. Finally checked the AllTrails app which showed us where we actually were. So we changed our plan and hiked to Hale Lake close to where we were. We saw all these buzzards flying around the lake and smelled an awful smell like rotten meat. We were on a trail that was up on a small hill around the lake. There were buzzards everywhere so we knew something was going on somewhere on the lake below. This lake is shaped like a horseshoe so we followed the trail around until there was a trail that led to a gazebo at the center of the horseshoe shaped lake. From that vantage point we could see an even bigger alligator laying on the opposite bank of the lake right below where we first discovered the buzzards. We were so glad we didn’t check out that lake bank in the beginning! The smell (we thought) was a wild pig which the alligator had just eaten. The buzzards were hopping all around him but the gator wasn’t moving. There were 20 buzzards on the ground and many more flying around circling. We figured the alligator had to be 12-14 ft long. It was definitely the highlight of our trip!

The next day we hiked from our campsite down past the observatory, took the Pilant Slough Trail to Elm Lake, and took that trail to 40 Acre Lake Trail that circles around the most popular lake in the park, where most visitors go to check out the gators and birds. What was fun about this lake is people tell you when they’ve located a gator. One gentleman who had a really long telephoto lenses told us about a gator on the bank just around the bend in the trail near the water. We rounded the turn and Mike got a photo of the smaller gator catching a turtle and we were close enough to hear the shell snap. The gator was on land and was next eyeing Enzo who thought he was something to play with. NOT. I told Mike we were too close and we hightailed it out of there.

We also got to see a Loon… I’ve only ever seen them in Maine where I used to vacation every summer with my parents. They are one of my favorite birds. I love their ‘laugh’ and their haunting cry they often do early in the mornings or late at night. I was sure it was a loon but couldn’t imagine they could be found down here in Texas! They will dive underwater for minutes at a time and then reappear some distance away. I checked google and they migrate south when the northern lakes freeze over to winter in this area. I got a really good telephoto of one sitting in a bush near 40 Mile Lake.

We did about 7 miles that day & we were exhausted and we had a couple of blisters. Even Enzo was tired. Time to relax and eat some homemade cookies and watch the deer behind our campsite.

The last day we were there was overcast and cloudy. We drove the truck down to the park store and got a couple of souvenirs… wearing our masks of course. We drove to the entrance and got photos of the gorgeous carved sign of the Brazos Bend alligator. Then we drove to the main visitors parking lot and walked around the 40 Acre Lake and decided this would also be a great day trip to do. I’m sure in the Spring, the lakes would actually look like lakes and not swampy bogs. Then we drove back to the campsite, loaded up the cats and the dog, hitched up, drove to their dump station, and were on our way back to home base–the ranch.

We arrived back to the ranch, unhitched and we had the weekend to relax there. I knew that the full-sized bed in the horse-trailer was the one item that I hated and Mike said the living area was just too small. After 7 years, we had reached our limit. Friday evening sitting on our couch in that trailer, we were checking out motorhomes on RVTrader. Mike saw one at Holiday World that really looked interesting.

So the next morning we ventured to the dealership in Katy… about 45 minutes away from the ranch to check it out. OMG… it was in horrible shape. The paint was all chipped and peeling, it had damage to the outside and the tires were worn. We didn’t even go inside. On our way back to the dealership, the salesman mentioned they had a 2015 Tiffin Allegro Open Road on the lot, would we be interested in looking at it? Sure, why not–the price was in our price point. But it was 35 foot long and we were looking for something a bit smaller. (I realized I had shown Mike this unit a few months ago–and it had bunk beds. I had told him we could renovate that area into an office but he wasn’t interested in doing anymore renovations since that’s all we seemed to do on the horse trailer with Living Quarters.) So I braced myself as we looked at it…first the outside and then the inside.

It was in great shape. They had reupholstered everything and it looked really nice. We found a chip in the windshield and the right-side camera didn’t work–and they said they would fix both. It had been there since August… I guess people weren’t looking for an RV with bunk beds. They were willing to work with us on the price and our trade-in of the truck & horse trailer and a few days later the Tiffin was ours! We had to pull our horse trailer and truck next to our new-to-us Class A and transfer everything from one to the other. No small task! Plus we had the cats and our dog with us too. We had thought it wouldn’t take too long but it took several hours. Thankfully, we had food in the fridge and pantry (and they had turned the Class A’s fridge on too) so we made ourselves lunch. Yum!

So, it was done and we drove the Class A back to the ranch where our other vehicle was. Of course there’s a learning curve to driving it! We pulled out of the Dealership, went a mile down the frontage road to our exit and put on the brakes–doesn’t stop like a truck, stops slowly…. and as soon we turned, the fridge opened up and everything came tumbling out! Fortunately there was a huge shoulder and we were able to stop and gather up all the food. Nothing broke! Yay!

The rest of the drive was uneventful except the mile long driveway to the ranch. It’s really bumpy to say the least–we had to do 5 mph up it. (Normally it’s awful for a normal vehicle–but this was beyond awful!)

We got to our RV spot and this Class A backs up beautifully. No turning in opposite direction or waiting for the trailer to respond… it does it promptly! So nice and made the setting up process better. We parked it on the wood boards we have since we didn’t want the rig to sit in the grass. Trying to get it level is a trick though, since the whole campground slopes downward. We’re still working on that. But that’s part of the adventure!