lake colorado city state park

Recently, I got reacquainted with the Lake Colorado City State Park. I have been there twice in recent months and am finding it a good place as a stopover while traveling from Austin to points west.With no decent hotels in the area, you must either drive longer to reach Midland/Odessa (where hotel prices are shocking due to the area's oil money), or explore the convenient alternatives at this park. If you have camping equipment or an RV, you should be able to find a campsite with no trouble as the park wasn't crowded when we were visiting. The campsites seemed tidy and well-kept.The park has another good alternative for travelers: small, one-room cabins with bunk beds (you supply the linens), microwave, small refrigerator, and window-unit A/C ($58.30 including tax). The cabins have a concrete porch with picnic table and benches. The porch is open on the sides with a roof so you can sit outside even if it's raining. Each cabin also has an outside grill. Most of the cabins have a nice setup facing the water, and are reasonably spaced. The worst one for view is cabin #1, closest to the bathroom. It sits in an open space next to the bathroom on the side of the road away from the water. The best cabin, in my mind, is #6, at the end of one loop, somewhat away from the others, and is on a slight rise with a great view of the water and nearby rock outcrops. Cabins 10 and 11 at the end of the other loop are almost, but not quite, as well situated as 6. If you want/need to be closer to the bathroom, cabins 2 and 3 are directly across from cabin 1, but with the advantage of being on the lake side with nice views. The cabins seemed clean and well-kept, except that the windows in cabin 6 were dangerous to try to raise up and down (heavy, hard to get to stay so they didn't slam down when released). Watch out for fingers if you try that! We mentioned to staff, hope they will attend to it.Regardless of which cabin or campsite you pick, be sure to take note of the many, varied, beautiful native plants. Yes, this is desert scrub and many of the plants are "well-defended," but just be careful and enjoy the display. In the spring, the Mexican buckeye, black dalea, Texas persimmon, sumacs, various daisies and other composites were all blooming, to name a few. In mid-July, the sweet clover was in full bloom, filling the air with its aroma. The place looked landscaped! (which of course it was, by Nature.) Except for a bit too much trash, especially down around the lake. With the water down, now would be a good time to take care of that (Hint to park personnel).If you're a bird lover, you can find shorebirds (avocets in the spring), ducks and other water birds, beauties like the scissor-tailed flycatchers, and birder specialties like Bell's vireos (singing like crazy in July!). Plus the usual assortment of hawks, woodpeckers, mockingbirds, thrashers, kingbirds, wrens, etc.Throw in some night owls and coyotes singing, mild evening temperatures for sitting outside (dry climate cools down more quickly at night), and you supply some good snacks/drinks so you don't have to try to find anything in Colorado City. Really, what more could one ask for a pleasant evening?If you need more, there are lots of interesting rock outcrops for kids and adults to scramble around on, trails to follow, plus cool lizards and other critters. And look at the stone work on the outside of the cabins--some of the stones have very interesting fossils!Each time, we have been almost the only ones in the cabins. This park is underused and probably under-appreciated. My biggest complaint is the bathroom, which needed better cleaning, and its sink faucets, which had some "automatic shutoff" faucets that were impossible to modulate so that you didn't get a big spray of water in your face instead of a stream of water in the sink. very annoying!

We stayed one night in this park while traveling through Texas. The park is big with a lot of sites. They have pull-thrus and back-ins, tent sites, electric/water, restrooms/showers (that needed cleaning) and a dump station. We had our pick of sites in the Rolling Hills Camping Area. We were the only ones there. We found a good level site with some grass. We didn't care about water views. We were so happy the park was beautiful, lots of little critters running about, and plenty of peace and quiet. We had no internet or cell service. We would stay again for sure, if passing through.

We wanted to come for a nice little visit to a familiar park and, whoa what a shock. First off, the heavy set shorter lady Mary Castillo is the rudest person I believe I have ever encountered within the State Parks system. I came up to the door and, had trouble getting in due to medical problems with my back. I said I can't push this open it's too hard mam and, she yelled back at me from behind the counter while still seated, youll have to push it harder mam. I felt insulted and ready to go home but, my husband came over and, opened it as he saw I was in distress and, getting nowwhere with the staff. When finally inside she was quick and, snide towards me as if I had interupted her meal which I smelled behind the counter on a table. The restrooms look so much better this time than last, and the staff is much more friendlier out in the park. Ranger Michael even offered to help us hook up our water and, electrical etc. as he could see we both don't get around so good. The rest of our stay was pleasant but, someone needs to replace that lady she is not a good public servant at all. My sister came a couple months ago and, said she was also kinda rude to her but, didn't report it.

We are bird watchers and this was an excellent place for this venue, lots of birds. But the restrooms were not up to par. Most of our state parks are really kept up and clean as far as restrooms go, this one was not. It was the fith one we visited in this trip.

Upon entering park in our Motor Home, I attempted to enter the park office to check in. I could not open the office door as it was extremely heavy and the door knob would not turn. Ms. Maria Castillo, employee on duty, yelled at me through the door way instructing me to push. After a minute or so of unsuccessfully struggling to get the door open, she yelled at me again. This went on for several minutes. She refused to get up out of her chair to assist me in opening the door. I finally had to yell back at her that I couldn't push any longer as I am disabled with metal rods in my back. She yelled at me several more times before she finally got up off her bottom, walked around the counter, and opened the door for me. She proceeded to scold me for not pushing harder. I explained about my disability as she checked me in. Once that process was complete she didn't even consider assisting me to get out of the door. An hour later my husband went up to the office to purchase a bag of ice (as there is an ice machine). My husband could not open the door as she had it locked. He knocked and she yelled at him through the door, 'We are closed!'. My husband yelled back, "It's only 4:30 not 5:00". A few minutes later she opened the door. When he inquired about purchasing a bag of ice she said they didn't have any.I will never go to this park again. If I hadn't of had such lovely experiences at other state parks prior to this, I can assure you I would never visit any Texas State Park again. I truly appreciate the kind and helpful staffs at Fort Davis State Park and Balmorhea State Park. Strike Lake Colorado City State Park off your list and stay elsewhere.How this woman is employed using some of my tax dollars is a mystery.

I hired on out at this park as a maintenance supervisor 2 in March and, as an avid RV'er myself I knew I had a battle to overcome. I quickly learned my job duties and, went on to various projects. My ideal of "results not excuses" has made a huge difference in motivating myself as well as my fellow workers to continue to strive for this parks re-beautification. I last week met a family staying in our Cabin facility and, while there had located an area of spawning fish. I verified the species to be Black Large mouth bass and, crappie for sure. Additionally, the Large day use areas have been cleaned up and, the swim beach is mowed and, clear of debris. Come out and, enjoy our park and, If I see you I will stop and, say Hi. Our park needs campers and, visitors to come enjoy its beauty.

But it will be back. It's not beautiful but its got a homey feeling.

Texas parks could at least warned you of the lack of fish (none) due to the power plant who leases land to the Texas parks. Not sure if I'd get in the water considering the power plant users it as cooling station. Park rangers blame lack of fish on golden algae, REALLY !!!! other than that it's a beautiful place to camp a night. Thanks again for the lack of info via your web sight TPWD!!!!!!!!

This is a good size state park (80 plus sites), well-maintained with friendly staff. But.....there's NOTHING here. It was obviously designed to be a boating/fishing sort of place,since it is on a small lake, but the problem is that the water is, and has been very, very low. I can't speak to swimming issues, since I was here in November (and I think I had the park to myself on a Friday night), but there appeared to be NO fishing going on whatsoever. They do have 11 basic cabins for rent, which have heat/ac, some bunkbeds, a small fridge and a microwave. Bottom line: seems ok for a night to look at night sky, build a campfire and cook some smores, but not much else, at least until water levels come back up (if ever).