Noticed that Jonesbrother Park in Jonestown (Lake Travis) is now charging $20 to enter the park, used to be free. Also, costs $20 to launch. I normally visit a few times a year to let my kids/dog run and swim and launch my kayak. I understand the need for funds for upkeep, but that seems steep just to enter the park and walk around the shoreline. I know Travis County also went to a $5/person + an additional $7 launch fee.


Parking fees: $20 per car per day for non-residents, pay at the VenTek machine in the park. (There is no charge for residents displaying a resident parking sticker on their vehicle.)


Boat launch fees: $20 for a daily boat launch pass, pay at the VenTek machine in the park.

So it's $20 to get in the park and another $20 to launch?

I went there several years ago and it was very dark when I launched, found the place to pay when I got back and paid the launch fee. About a month later a lady calls me and ask if I wished to plead guilty or not. I said guilty to what and she said launching without paying, I told her I had paid before I left. She had me to to a judge that was there and he said if I pleaded guilty I with get off with a $100 dollar fine. I told him that it's not shoplifting if you pay before you leave the store and I had paid, he simply said again do I want to plead guilty or not. So I had to pay because of some Barney Fife cop and a crooked judge, I have never launched there again.

Not sure exactly, but I think $20 total to enter the park and launch. That would be robbery if you have to pay $40 to enter and launch.

That sucks, but I've heard of the fines before at other ramps. I've also had buddies say they would pay on the way out and seem to forget.

I almost always pay on the way out at Fayette. The park rangers give me the stink eye and remind me of the honesty box and I remind them I don't have time to stop and pay as the fish are biting and I don't have 2 minutes to spare!

The reason they went up so much is that the park was originally set up for the folks living in Jonestown. Lago was still pretty small and anyone in Lago gets to use their ramps if they own property. Cedar Park had ramps closer to them on the east side of the lake. When that monstrosity called Terrvista got built it added thousands of new people coming to the park. During Covid the park got overwhelmed with people. It really was disastrous. There are houses there in front of the park and people were parking in front of the houses and a lot of those idiots would just park right in front of their driveways. It actually closed during the week for a while this summer because it got soooo crowded! $15.00 (the old fee) was pretty steep, but $20.00 is crazy. But I kinda get why they are doing it. Since I live in J town I'll opt for the annual pass for residents. They have someone at the machine now when you come in so not really a way not to pay when you enter. And only one fee to launch or use the park, FYI.

Good context! I launched my kayak a few times and was surprised by the amount of people in the park.

i do the same, pay on the way out, but they're always friendly as can be. then again i launch at park prairie. maybe thats the diffrence?

we use to launch at jtown and had the annual pass, but there as no refund of the annual pass when their ramp was out of the water (which was frequent). the excuse was "we're using it to build a second ramp that will not be dry as often. guess what. they built the second ramp and it gave them a whole extra 3 or 4 feet of water. big whup! haven't launched there in almost a decade.

Three or four feet for me means driving 40 miles to put in at the dam. Right now J town and Mansfield are the only public ramps open and usable that I'm aware of. Worth it for me. FYI, they have three ramps now. (But 2 & 3 are about the same depths)

No. One or the other.

And don't even think about not paying. I've watched the maintenance crew foot patrol the lot, as in they'll get out of the city truck and walk down the rows checking.

I'd like to get to Travis more often but dang if I don't need a second mortgage just to get my boat on the lake. For us out-of-towners, LT is a pick your poison kind of lake. It either takes forever towing your boat around the lake looking for a place to drop in just to save a buck or it takes forever idling out of the J-Town no-wake zone with some lengthy cruise times to get to some fishing areas upstream. Despite the big waves and treacherous conditions at times, Travis can be a fun lake.

When Bassmasters was here in May of 2018 Swindle said that his family was so poor they would have to put the fees on layaway! LOL!

Isn’t Swindle one of the highest paid pros on any of the circuits?

He should be making good coin from those General Tire commercials!

Maybe he blows all his money on bright yellow shoes!