Canoeing the Texas Colorado ~ La Grange to Columbus
- Scott and Dottie Moore
- May 3
- 5 min read
These are the pictures and words of the 36.75 mile overnight recon my son Leif and I made in February 2026. We launched into the Texas Colorado River from the La Grange boat ramp. Our take out was Howell's Riverfront in Columbus. Frank Howell provided the shuttle.
My wife Dottie woke with us at 5:00 am, Wednesday morning, February 11th 2026. She fed us a hearty breakfast. Then she and Leif fixed my computer and printed the word map I had written of the upcoming run. That word map turned out to be important for this planned three day, two night trip.
On the road by 7:15, temperatures fell as we approached La Grange. We launched under an overcast sky at 9:58. The temperature was 50 degrees.
On the water, the Spirit II canoe handled the 670+ pounds of crew and gear fine. The river was staged between 3.4' and 3.5' at the La Grange gauge. Minutes after launching we saw a bald eagle and several wild turkey. This was going to be a good trip!
Forty-five minutes from our launch we passed White Rock Park. A little downriver we encountered a flock of white pelicans. We crossed paths with those birds by and by.
At 12:20 we reached the eight mile marker of the trip, the pump station.
Minutes later we reached a long, complex river feature I call the Cedar Creek Hybrid Bar. It starts out as a gravel bar and shifts to a sandbar. We landed in the mucky middle where the gravel began transitioning to sand. We re-launched and re-landed at the foot of this geomorphic feature. A calmer, cleaner landing, the hybrid bar here was comprised entirely of sand. Maybe I will camp here on a future trip.
Though I didn't get the strategic pictures of the site, wildlife and their sign were prevalent. On this trip many bald eagles and their nests were seen.
By 2:30 we passed a low, long, and overgrown island. We were twelve miles into the trip. I didn't photograph the island. Our next milestone was an active gravel pit. Here we encountered some swift shallows. We pushed over the submerged gravelbars without lining the canoe.
At the 3:38 we reached a point sandbar at the 16 mile point of the trip. With the unfamiliar river and the winter days short, we pitched camp here. Located in a scrap of prairie, our camp was 6' to 8' higher than the river. Of the sites I have camped on in the Colorado Lower Basin, this was the most remote. Nice.
My hit and miss picture documentation continued. For supper we enjoyed a single skillet meal cooked over my Coleman 424 stove.
A hush draped over the evening when the sun met the horizon. Across the river alternating formations of European starlings abandoned and flocked a barren pecan tree. When the last colony vacated all they left was the quiet.
We went to bed at sunset. In the tent I studied the word map with a pen light while listening to the barred owls and coyotes. I slept deeply and peacefully.
The next morning was calm, with a temperature of 50 degrees and a blue sky. Faint sounds from the distant gravel pit and highway drifted to us through the bare trees. While I cooked breakfast the pelican flock flew past us. They glided down the riverbed from upstream and landed in a shallow swift. They swam against the current, working towards us. A bald eagle flew over the camp, scattering the pelicans. That was the last we saw of those big white birds.
I photographed the clinging sheds of the insects that swarmed the tent the night before. I am always glad to sleep in a tent!
Our plan was to canoe to a site eight to twelve miles downriver and make the second camp. Anticipating a leisurely 2nd day and an easy 3rd day, we casually launched at 11:13 am. By 11:37 we reached the Pettys Creek Sandbar. This is a remote and isolated site but we wanted to make more miles that day.
Images of the Pettys Creek Sandbar are below.
By now the gears in Leif's head were turning. He wanted to set a new personal distance record. I could enforce the schedule and squash my son's ambition, or I could be generous and allow him to make the trip more his own.
We had the margin. The three day trip was stacked in front of a weekend. If we hustled, the remaining daylight was adequate. The weather was fantastic with fair and mild winds. Food and water were good through Saturday. If we ran out of daylight we could camp on any number of sandbars above Columbus.
I wasn't about to block my 16 year old son's aspirations. We calculated the time and distance with the word map, and decided to turn the three day trip into an overnight run. We took the challenge, now we were racing the sun!
The rest of the day we powered past river features and I took notes as fast as I could. And I have an excuse to make this run again!
Below are the maps from the second day.
By 12:30 we blasted past the Rebuilt Island that marked 20+ miles of the trip.
At 1:42 we took a lunch break on a long, low, lateral sandbar I marked as 1st Adventure Picnic on the map. We were 23 miles into the trip.
At 2:12 we passed what I thought would be the Crier Creek Sandbar. This turned out to be a low sand bluff on the inside of a bend and the geological curiosity of the trip.
An eagle oversaw our second break on another lateral sandbar. We were at the place marked 2nd Adventure Picnic on the map, just shy 30 miles into the trip.
We passed the Thousand Trails Sandbar at 4:45.
We reached the pylon at 4:57, 33+ miles into the trip. This was the home stretch.
Below that marker the river slows and shallows, characterizing much of the Colorado for the next thirty something miles. Islands rose between the two sets of Columbus 71 bridges. I think we took the shallowest paths around those obstacles! This was the second lining of the trip. Within a few paces we were back in the canoe. I took no pictures of those islands and shallows, but they are there!
We reached Frank's place at 5:50. By dark the van was loaded. It was a great trip ! On this trip we saw over a dozen bald eagles, an opossum, a nutria rat, a mussel, four or more wild turkey, four deer, a lone boar feral hog, a feral hog sow and her piglets, various cranes, pelicans, ducks and other migratory birds.
The first day we had the river to ourselves. The second day we met a motorboat and a kayaker. Both parties were friendly and courteous. There was a couple hours on the second day where cell phone service was intermittent. This stretch of the Colorado is laced with sandbars.
Thanks for reading!
See the links to other articles on canoeing the Colorado Lower Basin are below.
Canoeing the El Camino Real Paddling Trail
The Vernon to Plum Run link is below.
Canoeing the Plum to La Grange
Canoeing the Columbus Paddling Trail
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