San Angelo State Park — Attraction in San Angelo

We have enjoyed staying at San Angelo State Park because of the natural things it offers. We stayed in the Red Arroyo campground. The sites are large and well-spaced apart. You don't have much privacy due to the lack of trees since this is where the prairie and desert come together, but the distance between sites helps. Also, having a picnic table and covered shelter at each site is a nice touch.

One thing we noticed is that when the wind gets going here it really blows hard, so be prepared to take care of anything that might need to be held down. Several times it was bad enough that we had to close our roof vent.

The night sky is decent because it's so wide open, unfortunately, it's not as dark as we had hoped because of the lights from nearby San Angelo. You also tend to hear some road noise -- it's not bad, just louder than we expected considering how this place seems like it would be in the middle of nowhere from most of the pictures. Given the expansive horizon, though, you're in for some really cool sunrises and sunsets right from your campsite.

The hiking, biking, and equestrian trails here offer a lot of variety and with 50 miles of them, it's tough to get bored. Note that the North and South units have separate trail systems and there's no road within the park to reach the two units. You have to drive out on the main road and it's too far to bike or walk.

In addition to trails, make sure you check out the wildlife blind set up near the Red Arroyo loop, plus on Saturday and Wednesday mornings, the rangers do supplemental feeding of the bison and longhorn cattle herds, bringing them right up to the fence for visitors to see. It's a nice treat! As you hike, you're likely to see plenty of wildlife, too. We have seen deer, owls, birds, and javelinas so far.

Cell service was pretty good for Verizon and T-Mobile. (2-3 bars consistently)

The only real complaint (other than tiring of the wind after a while) was that the bathrooms are really old. They are kept clean and the showers were hot with good, modern showerheads. But in Red Arroyo, there is only one shower for women and one for men for the whole campground. And there also are very limited toilets in the main bathhouse and the secondary bathhouse has at least one defunct toilet in the men's room. The whole park could use a bathroom/shower house overhaul. It hasn't been very busy with campers here but we could see that a busy season could wreak havoc on bathroom availability.

Note that if you're coming for O.C. Fisher Lake, that is a reservoir that is emptying out and never likely to come back. A ranger told us the lake is at about 6-8% of its glory days. The place is filled with boat ramps to nowhere and when hiking you can find several abandoned campground loops.

All-in-all a good place to stay but go in with...

It’s not a destination vacation, but if you find yourself stuck in the area, it’s one of the best things to do if you’re trying to stay out of trouble.

The water level in the reservoir is low, but there’s still one boat ramp accessible, and that’s the one nearest the dam.

Other things to do here: Tent camping, RV spots with electricity and water, or you can rent a cabin.

And, oh yeah, there’s always the option of hiking alongside the “Official State of Texas Longhorn Herd!” (more on that later)

Hiking: You can spend a few days out here and still not get to every trail. I managed to hit about 70% of them over several days.

It’s west Texas, so don’t expect a whole lot of elevation change, but the cool thing is there’s hardly anyone on these trails! The park is so huge, that there are separate trail maps for the northern and southern section, so make sure you grab one of each before you begin your journey.

Favorite trails: Roller Coaster Trail (the most elevation change (only about 70 feet over the course of half a mile) and a couple of good views of the open plains) Playground Trail (probably the best for mountain biking, but can also be confusing and hard to find your way out toward the end) Flintstone Village Trail North and South Slick Rock Trails- nice ups and downs - also good for mountain bikers.

Least favorite trails: Badlands Trail - pretty flat, and TONS of side trails created by mountain bikers, so it’s very easy to get lost here. Roadrunner Trail/Strawberry Trail - VERY flat, boring, and easy.

Longhorn spotting: Trailhead to Trailhead Route (look for the water trough just south of where Flintstone Village Trail intersects with the Trailhead to Trailhead Route) Here’s where I encountered the most longhorn. It was on the Badlands Trail and parts of the River Bend Trail. They’re docile for the most part, but don’t be surprised if you turn a corner and encounter one that doesn’t want to move off of the trail. I had one that snorted/grunted at me and that told me it was time to back out and take a different trail!

I like the trails in the northern part more than the southern part. They’re just more fun. Although Roller Coaster Trail in the southern part was fun and had some good views, so it’s worth a spin.

Kudos to the person who came up with the fun trail names like Badlands, Roller Coaster Trail, Playground Trail, Flintstone Trail, Lanky Lackey, Winding Snake, Cougar Overlook and Lower Ghost Camp Trail. I guess that person was on vacation when they decided to name the Trailhead to Trailhead Route. What the hell does that even...

Beautiful park BUT totally mismanaged. We stayed at the bald eagle campsite, there is nobody at the entrance, we had to unlock and open the manual gate and locked it behind us with a padlock, small numbers! You would need a magnifier and a light if you arrive at night. The code is mentioned at the end of an email! Then there was no map and no directions to help us to find our site. The bald eagle dump station doesn’t work. We had to go out, unlock open manual gate, close, lock, unlock open close and lock again! We had to go again 30 min drive to register as there is nobody at the north side. Almost all the campsites have a reserved tag and show reserved online as well but we were by ourselves for two days, then we got neighbors but the rest of the campsite was almost empty. People supposedly don’t show up, they should make them pay for not canceling that would give more possibilities for others to enjoy the campsite. The trees look scalped, they got crazy on cutting branches down. There is no direct connection between the bald eagle camping area and the north concho camping area where the trailhead is. But you can see the other side, they just didn’t clear up a path to it. You have to drive, unlock the manual gate, close it, lock it, drive 2 min down the highway, unlock the other manual gate, open it, close it, lock it and same things over again on your way back. And you have to do the same thing each time for each trip to the trails or dump station or to go out. At the campsite and the trails the grass is cut down pretty well so it’s easy to walk around safely. There are a lot of trails and we were basically by ourselves hiking. We could see the bisons only on Saturday at 10 am when they feed them. We saw some deers. During the weekend there are more people. When we came out from the gate people asked the code that we didn’t give them and others entered when we were opening pushing their way in saying they have a spot in the campsite! So this code business put us in a very bad position, and it should not be up to us to regulate who can pass or not! That’s totally ridiculous and can lead to bad arguments! We were there to relax not to play cops. They don’t change the fire warning: low risk in one side, extremely high risk in the other side, 2 min away!! The park and trails are beautiful but there are a lot of things they should improve to make the stay...