When you guys camp out do the land owners ever get mad at you for camping on their property? I plan on doing an overnight trip one of these days.

you can camp in a lot of places that are not the land owners

Without permission, you put yourself at risk.

Landowners don't take kindly to tresspassers and will usually verify the tresspass and simply call the Game Warden or BRA.

Those folks who exercise the right to carry firearms on overnighters can find themselves in a world of trouble with a tresspass violation being upgraded to criminal tresspass.

Firearm or not, it's gonna be a bad day.

There are so many great spots to camp within the river bed on most of the Middle/Upper. Your much better off utilizing one of those sites.

Honestly, I can't blame the landowners for not wanting folks on their land.

Most of the Middle/Upper has been in drought conditions on and off over the years. Their main concern is fire hazzard and folks wondering around well outside the campsite to gather firewood, etc.. Trash and other generated waste is also a concern.

I visited one of my favorite remote campsites yesterday while taking a break on the river, only to find someone had bagged up a 20 gallon trash bag filled with empty beer cans/trash and left it for the next guy to deal with.

I passed back by at the end of the day and strapped it to my yak (along with the broken camp chairs they left ) and lugged it back down river.

I wish I had a $5.00 bill for every time I've had to lug/burn someone elses trash from a Brazos Basin campsite!

I guess if the water level doesn't change at night you would be fine down near the river

There are a good number of great campsites along that stretch that are well out of harms way. Even with a 5000 CFS release from upstream.

Below PK - How high does / can the water rise during one of the larger releases.


2 ft, 3 ft 5 ft ?

That specific info would help a non local guy choose a river bed site.


thanks !

5000 CFS will usually take it up about 8 to 10 ft., depending where you are on the river.

Just look for traces of the high watermarks in the river bed and go from there.

That being said, knowing what to look for and being able to understand and interpret what you are seeing in a given river/riverbed will serve you much better than being "local", IME.

Dave- I also want to do the camping trip. We should try to get a small group together and do it. I went out to the Brazos this past Sat (10/17/09) and the river was down pretty good, but still it was a great time.

Count me in to join and I'm sure a couple others who paddle with me will want to participate as well.

I am planning on going up there in the future and would also like to do some camping on the river. How would I go about finding a public campsite if I have never been there before. Any help is appreciated.
Also, is there a way to find out about water releases before they happen?

There is a free public BRA campsite within a five minute drive of Hwy 16 at the Brazos. The campground basically sits in the shadow of the damn.

Call the Brazos River Authority before you go and ask them if they have any big releases scheduled. They can tell you if they have anything scheduled. Watch the forecast before you go, not just in the area you will be camping but all the drainage upriver from where you will be - they will release large amounts of water that was not scheduled if the river comes down big upstream. You can also go to www.brazos.org and check river flow rates at many different points in the river before you go.

Thanks for the great info B_Rod and JakeFlycast.

It went from about 45 cfs this morning to 4200 cfs now. Brought it up about 7 feet.