Arizona to Houston TX & Back

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NUKEM

NUKEM

10 Year
Joined
Apr 6, 2014
Threads
10
Messages
118
Location
Prescott Arizona
Hello, My wife and I making a 4 day weekend trip to Houston from Prescott Arizona. I'm picking up an Adventure Trailer (Chaser) the weekend of 22nd-25th of August. We need some ideas of what to do & see along or route. We would like to camp one or two nights with the new trailer. ?South Padre Island? I know nothing about Texas so fill me in. Thanks Marshall:meh:
 
Do you plan to do any wheeling? You have a few options. You could take i10 into Texas and head south to Big Bend National Park. This is one of the most desolate and beautiful places in Texas, so you'll need to be self sufficient if you are camping. It's pretty hot out in the desert at this time, so be forewarned.

If you had straight east towards Houston, you could make a pit stop by Austin and check out Hidden Falls Adventure Park which is an offroad park which also offers full service or primitive camping spots. Stop by in Austin and check out the town, it's pretty cool.

You could also tour the Hill Country and see some beautiful sights and camp at some pretty cool camping spots. We did a 5-day camping trip which consisted of driving, checking out the small towns, and camping at a different place every night.

If you head into Dallas, there are a few nice off-road parks there.

Come into Houston and check out Matagorda beach which offers 26 miles of beach roads which will require 4-wheel drive.

Many options for you
 
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and get yourself ready for the humidity....

I think I'd do my camping around the hill country, anywhere west of San Antonio....but there is the allure of remote beach camping.
 
duggy said:
Do you plan to do any wheeling? You have a few options. You could take i10 into Texas and head south to Big Bend National Park. This is one of the most desolate and beautiful places in Texas, so you'll need to be self sufficient if you are camping. It's pretty hot out in the desert at this time, so be forewarned.

If you had straight east towards Houston, you could make a pit stop by Austin and check out Hidden Falls Adventure Park which is an offroad park which also offers full service or primitive camping spots. Stop by in Austin and check out the town, it's pretty cool.

You could also tour the Hill Country and see some beautiful sights and camp at some pretty cool camping spots. We did a 5-day camping trip which consisted of driving, checking out the small towns, and camping at a different place every night.

If you head into Dallas, there are a few nice off-road parks there.

Come into Houston and check out Matagorda beach which offers 26 miles of beach roads which will require 4-wheel drive.

Many options for you
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Thanks ! That will help plan our trip for sure
 
SWUtah said:
I was just this last weekend on the beach in Corpus Christi, 90+% humidity. Don't camp out, you need air conditioning. Especially if you are accumulated to Arizona.
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Thanks ! That would be a bummer for sure! My wife would melt ! LOL
 
HFDPNL said:
and get yourself ready for the humidity....

I think I'd do my camping around the hill country, anywhere west of San Antonio....but there is the allure of remote beach camping.
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Thanks we are from Arizona whats this thing you call humidity? LOL maybe we better just head home? LOL
 
Padre is going to be out of your way, but it's not bad if you stay on the island this time of year.

Most things in Texas seem to be centered around the I-35 & I-45 corridor. Depending on your timeframe, you could stay in Galveston near Houston, if not I'd definitely plan on spending the night west of Houston. North of Houston is not bad, but will be humid in the summer. If you have the time, drive up to around the Austin and San Antonio area, anywhere west/northwest of there is good scenery and camping. Sonora is pretty cool, they have a good, small cavern there. Definitely recommend Big Bend, even if only for a day.

Have fun and be safe, sounds like it will be a quick trip.
 
The Big Bend of the Rio Grande. Stay up in the Basin. Here's a link to the Basin weather: http://raws.wrh.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/roman/meso_base.cgi?stn=CSBT2&unit=0&time=LOCAL

I go there in the summer to escape the heat and humidity. Light on tourists, long on big sunsets.

Santa Elena Canyon on the west side of the park (at night)

p1733374676-4.jpg


Sotol Vista sunset (bring your lawnchairs and cool beverages. Stay for the night light show (stars). It's one of the darkest sites in the US

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p173180069-4.jpg


Not far from Santa Elena the Rio Grande had backed into an arroyo (it's supposed to be up this week)

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Boquillas Canyon on the east side.

p983845841-4.jpg


A visitor on the Mexican side

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If you go... you will be back :) And yes... it's on the border but it's so remote... I go numerous times a year and I have never had a problem, even in the back country, not counting a flat... that sucked...

If you want to add some fun and a little strange to the visit go into old Terlingua and see the sites. Have a meal at the Starlite. Check out the cemetery

p572469602-4.jpg
 
I agree with what Mike said, although it is a little bit of a detour off of I-10. We went down last Feb and stayed at the resort in Lajitas. Beautiful country and the resort has a nice golf course. We only spent a day in the park, but I've been planning a return trip to camp.

Definitely not humid there.

Sonora is pretty too, but I wouldn't stay there unless your trip just falls that way, maybe just stop while passing through on 10.

Tons to do in San Antonio. Hot, but dry.

Galveston IS close to Houston, and there are a number of places you can drive/camp on the beach.

I really shouldn't hate on my city, we've actually had a relatively cool summer. There's a number of good places to eat in town. I'd just stay in the car or inside buildings during the heat of the day. If you're camping outside of town, I'd agree with West side(Past Katy) or Galveston(about an hour south).
 
Night photography is easy thanks to digital. Camera in manual. Tripod/ You need a wide / fast lens. Wide like 14mm to 21mm. Fast as in small f stop. f2.8 is good, f 1.4 is better. Wide angle lenses are more tolerant of long exposure. Exposure times at night can be as long as 30s. A camera that does pretty well at higher ISO is nice. I try to use no higher than ISO 1600.

If you own Photoshop or Elements you can use a dark frame to remove noise. Lightroom doesn't work, you need the functionality of layers. Basically you let the camera warm or cool to ambient, set the exposure to what you want to use, leave the lens cap on, make an image, and then subtract the dark frame in Photoshop or Elements. Youtube has tons of tutorials on how to do that and it's really easy.

Here's a time lapse of last nights Perseids. It covers from about 3:30am to 5:00-ish am. I used a 15mm f2.8 lens on a full frame camera. Exposure time was 10s and I had to drop the exposure in post processing about 1/3 of a stop which means I could have lowered the ISO a click.

Best viewed full screen. They are pretty faint and the light of the full moon makes them even harder to see.



PM me and I'll put a PDF file that a friend of mine put together into DropBox

Better still, none of this is copyrighted and TJ doesn't mine people sharing it so:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/49410309/Night Photography Info/Starshots by TJAvery.pdf


I scrounged some other info that might interest you:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/49410309/Night Photography Info/Eclipse Notes.pdf

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/49410309/Night Photography Info/Eclipse Notes.txt

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u...hy Info/How to Photograph a Lunar Eclipse.pdf

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/49410309/Night Photography Info/Untitled.pdf

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/49410309/Night Photography Info/Lunar Eclipse Exposure.GIF
 
For camping close to Houston don't forget about Brazos Bend State Park south of highway 59. The George Observatory usually has a good observing program every weekend. It's surprising how well you can see there even though it's close to the lights of Houston

During the morning it's nice to walk around 40 acre lake or any of the other trails. There is a lot of wildlife there.
 
Last thing on Big Bend. If you are in reasonably decent shape the loop around the South Rim is a nice hike. Take plenty of water and some snacks. I use a 3L Camelbak and take a 1L bottle with me too. Get up early, grab a good breakfast at the restaurant, head out at around 7am or so. I always go up the Pinnacles trail and down Laguna Meadows (clockwise) but I recently found out that it's an easier hike going up Laguna Meadows and down Boot Canyon and the Pinnacles. It's a full day but a satisfying day. I hiked it 3 times last year. 5 total.

Don't underestimate the Window trail. It's one of the shorter trails but you're going downhill on the cool of the morning and uphill with no cover in the late morning.

Here's a shot from the rim
p1748453068-4.jpg
 
I think the general consensus here is that you should head to Big Bend!
 
Thank you so much @Mike6158. Those are great pictures. I appreciate the information so much. If we don't make Big Bend Park this trip I am planning a trip back in the fall. After much consideration this being a new to us Chaser Trailer http://www.expeditionportal.com/forum/threads/129174-A-T-Chaser-for-sale that we've never set up or used before maybe we should take it slow this trip. If it was just me I would be camping in Santa Elena Canyon. So long story short booked the KOA in San Antonio. Will KOA Camp and check everything out and head into town for dinner and drinks. Thank you everyone for all of this great information. All of your feedback made me think that we should start a state to state "What to do and see" from a Land Cruisers perspective.
 
4 days? That's a short time for a lot of driving. I live in austin and used to live in Phoenix with a girlfriend in Prescott. Done the trip a few times, myself.

Big bend is gonna be pretty out of the way for you if you only have 4 days to do this...

And I-10 is a terribly boring and uneventful drive for hours and hours and hours.

If I were you I'd head east straight out of Prescott and get to 260 and cut over through New Mexico to Roswell. There's a lot of good camping near ruidoso and even before that. Once you hit Roswell you drop straight down through Carlsbad then to I-10.

You could cut through the hill country via Fredericksburg (camping at enchanted rock is nice)/Austin or head straight to San Antonio.

South padre is gonna be out of the way for you, as well, and it's HOT down there to be beach camping this time of year.
 
Grundletaint said:
4 days? That's a short time for a lot of driving. I live in austin and used to live in Phoenix with a girlfriend in Prescott. Done the trip a few times, myself.

Big bend is gonna be pretty out of the way for you if you only have 4 days to do this...

And I-10 is a terribly boring and uneventful drive for hours and hours and hours.

If I were you I'd head east straight out of Prescott and get to 260 and cut over through New Mexico to Roswell. There's a lot of good camping near ruidoso and even before that. Once you hit Roswell you drop straight down through Carlsbad then to I-10.

You could cut through the hill country via Fredericksburg (camping at enchanted rock is nice)/Austin or head straight to San Antonio.

South padre is gonna be out of the way for you, as well, and it's HOT down there to be beach camping this time of year.
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Thanks, yes you are right I did the drive from Savanna GA back to Phoenix 18 yrs ago I thought Texas would never end :bang: I was hoping to make this a little better trip for my wife. We are planing on leaving Thursday night and tag team driving to Houston picking up the trailer Friday Afternoon and head back West. We'll see how it feels. Thanks again
 
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