Passport to Texas

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish Restoration Program

There’s something special about experiencing Texas from a kayak or canoe. And lucky for us, we have coastal and inland paddling trails to accommodate all levels of watery wanderlust.

The Texas paddling trails program began informally about a decade ago when Texas Parks and Wildlife set up some coastal paddling trails.

Shelly Plante is nature tourism coordinator for Texas Parks and Wildlife. That first trail was just the beginning.

From that project, we now have seven coastal paddling trails in our paddling trail program. And, in March of 2006, we launched our first inland paddling trail in Luling.

Other inland paddling trails are set to open throughout the year. Active community partners, and a thorough evaluation, are required of all would be trails – inland or coastal.

There are a few steps that need to happen for a paddling trail to become one of ours. And that includes a river survey to look at the water quality. Look at the wildlife, ecology, fishing opportunities that can happen along that river or bay. And then, again, meeting with the community, having a community partner that’s actively involved and interested in having paddlers come to their site. And then, developing kiosk materials, because we will have educational kiosks at every access point.

More on paddling trails tomorrow.

That’s our show for today…supported by the Sport Fish Restoration program… providing funding for wetland conservation through the Private Lands Enhancement Program.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti

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