Sandy Creek National Park

After two nights in Texarkana we had a plan and we also had a couple of surprises. The first being that my daughter Lauren will be coming over to stay with us for a few weeks. The second was that our new friends Chuck and Ceal had thrown in their volunteer job at Hot Springs due to the conditions and said that they would love to meet up with us again. We were truly flattered and of course we said yes! That sadness we felt in leaving them two days ago was gone and we were so excited to be catching up with them again so soon. We let them know of our plans and we agree to meet up at Sandy Creek.

We arrived at Sandy Creek not knowing what to expect. The park is run by the Army Corp of Engineers or ACE. Now here is an interesting fact, the ACE run and maintain all the fresh waterways across the states including the canals in places like New Orleans. This means that just about every park run by ACE will be on the water and they are not expensive to stay at. This one at Sandy Creek cost only $16 a night, electricity and water included. A dump station is located on site for black and grey water.

We checked in at the gatehouse and were given a map of the park. It is huge with the sites well dispersed with both 30 and 50 amp sites. Our only consideration was to make sure the site near us had 50 amp power for Chuck's motor home. We found two suitable sites and settled ourselves in. Unfortunately a few technical problems prevented our friends from making the entire trip that day, so they let us know that they would be doing an overnight Walmart stop and joining us the following day. So we soaked up the beautiful sunset across the lake (it was our last as the the weather changed to windy and cloudy for the rest of our stay) and enjoyed the warmer climate. After putting up with minus 3 degrees for the last few nights the 9 degree heatwave went down really well.

Sunset at the Park


The next day we needed to go into the township of Jasper to get some supplies and refuel the truck. As Rose was not feeling well I left her tucked up in front of the heater. Shopping done and the last thing on the shopping list was a bottle of scotch (for medicinal purposes of course). Liquor stores are sometimes hard to find in some American counties and this one was no different - the closest one was 10 miles out of town. On the way out I passed Chuck and Ceal so rang them and gave them final directions to the park. I arrived back at the park just as they pulled up at the front gate. To compensate for the delays and hassles they had encountered we cooked dinner for four that night.

Chuck and Ceals motor home. It has heated floors and they tow a V8 Jeep behind it!


As the weather was still cold and not really suitable for any outdoor activities we all decided to head into the township of Lufkin (which was about 50 miles away) to see the new Jack Reacher movie. We would never think to drive that far for any movie but Jack Reacher was definitely worth the trip! Back to the park for baby smoked ribs for dinner bought all the way from Hot Springs.

Everything in Texas is big, even the trucks!



The weather channel is our guide these days and indications where that the current cold, stormy conditions where not going to improve any day soon so we all agreed to head further south to the city of Galveston. Galveston sits on the west side of the Gulf of Mexico and we were hopeful that it would produce some warmth and sunshine. A quick check of campsites available in the area we booked two sites at one of the many Texan State Parks, this one being right on the beach front for only $25 a night.

Galveston, oh Galveston..............


- Posted by RnR on their IPad

Location:Jasper,United States