Campsites at Inks Lake, Kerrville-Schreiner, Garner SPs

I hope you are aware that Texas State Parks charge a daily per person admission fee, in addition to the camping fee. At Inks Lake that is $6 per person age 13 and up. Garner is $7. If you are going to spend enough days in Texas State Parks, a $70 one year Park Pass is worth the costs and gives you one day camping at half price for up to four different visits during that year.

jamway wrote:
Unless things have changed at TX. S. P's. you can't reserve a specific site.

Most of the time they will let you look at the open sites and pick the one you like the best.

In Jan 2014, Texas State Parks started to allow site specific reservations for some of the premium FHU sites at Lake Livingston State Park. The program was supposed to expand as the state staff and park personnel developed familiarity with the process.

Texas SP Reservations system is run by Active Network, LLC - the company which acquired Reserve America in 2009.

While volunteering as a park host at a TX state park in 2014, I was told that at one time Texas used RA, but made the change to Active Network's Infospherix product - in part due to a lower bid, but also because the parks wanted to do away with site specific reservations.

Ohio and Pennsylvania were the only other states which used Active Network for reservations two years ago, but both have moved to Reserve America's portal.

Thank you all for the campsite information. This gives me a good idea where to start at the those state parks. So many good comments about Inks Lake, I think we will try for that one.
Starting out in Palestine for a wedding the first weekend, Hill Country the middle of the week, then an Air Force retirement at Lackland AFB the second weekend. Gonna be a great trip!!

Inks Lake is one of our favorite Texas State Parks. As others have said, you are assigned a site when you arrive. We asked for a waterfront site and were assigned site 260. It is a spacious back in site with lots of room behind the parking pad to set out our chairs and enjoy the view.

You can see photos and read about our stay at this blog post More of the beautiful Texas Hill Country around Inks Lake. The photo at the top of the page shows our chairs behind our campsite.

markm wrote:
Planning a few days camping in Texas Hill Country. Considering Inks Lake, Kerrville-Schreiner, and Garner state parks. I have the maps for each campground, so now looking for suggestions for the best campsites in each park.

We like shaded and fair amount of space between each campsite.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Unless things have changed at TX. S. P's. you can't reserve a specific site.

Most of the time they will let you look at the open sites and pick the one you like the best.

Kerrville-Schreiner is no longer a state park, but it is still a very good park. It was transferred to the city, which takes pride in having a great park.

Inks Lake is probably my favorite in the Texas SP system. Sites 83-93 and 291-294 and 211-215 are purposely open with almost no trees around. We prefer 258-275 area.

Like most Texas state parks, you cannot reserve a specific site, only a type of site. All RV sites at Inks Lake 50 amp with water hookups.

Garner is two very separate sections - Old Garner - the Oakmont RV area - is part of the original park and generally some shade - 30 amp only, with water hookups. The sites are pretty close together. Not commercial RV park close, but closer than many folks would like.

New Garner includes - the River Crossing camping area is an open field, mainly for groups and overflow.

The Shady Meadows area has some open areas, but sites 25 to 40 are very nice shady and a bit apart from each other. 134-143 are nice but short for my 36 footer.

The Persimmon Hill area is no utilities and the river side of the Rio Frio camping area is also no utilities. The higher center loop of Rio Frio is 30 amp and water and not crowded. Also the away from the river section of Rio Frio with power.

The Live Oak area is an open loop but trees around most sites. We prefer the 344 to 356 area on the river side.

Note - none of the campsites are 'river front'. Those in Live Oak, Rio Frio and Shady Meadow are on a bluff a bit above the river. There are several paths down to the river.

Those in Old Garner (Oakmont) are all across a road from the river. Also Oakmont is where all the day use folks come for the beach and activities.

Inks Lake is perhaps the best connected park in the system with a wonderful WiFi network.

Garner is the least connected - with no WiFi and no Verizon or ATT or Sprint cell phone service.

It's hard to go wrong in Inks Lake State Park. We have stayed there several times over the years, but I cannot remember the site numbers, just that it was always good.

We have not stayed at Schreiner, but we did drive through it. Again, I can't help with the site numbers.

Same for Garner, though it has been longer ago that we stayed there.

I also use Google Earth to get an idea about sites. It works for some better than for others. Sometimes a great help, sometimes none.

There is two campgrounds at Kerrville-Schreiner Park. One is on the river the other is across the road and in the woods. We stayed in the one across the road in Deerfield Loop site #125. Very nice park very quite and had deer grazing in our site.

I've not been to those SP's, but I compare the site maps with Google Maps. This gives one a better picture of the sites, some even have a street level 360 view.