The newest State Park in Texas is slated to open this year in Palo Pinto County; Park Ranger Kate Offers Monthly Updates

By Kate Fisher / TPWD Park Ranger

Special to Mineral Wells Area News

Holidays at Palo Pinto

Ranger Kate Fisher

Wow! Those holidays sure flew by. It’s been truly wonderful to see the support of our neighbors and the local community as we continue to push forward in making this park a reality.

A few weeks ago, staff got together to throw an appreciation dinner for our Friends Group, Palo Pinto Mountains State Park Partners, to show our gratitude for everything they do to support the park. Then came Thanksgiving with many more celebrations to follow.

The Christmas Lights Parade in Strawn was so fun as we decorated a float in twinkling lights. Park staff also made time to enjoy the holiday season with a Christmas party of our own before scattering for different family events. Now 2023 has passed us by, and 2024 is here!

In the middle of all the festivities, we got the “All clear,” to move into the maintenance building. Bit by bit, all our maintenance equipment and supplies made the short trip to a permanent location.

Along with this, crews are installing the piles for our large fishing pier with the help of a crane and a barge. This pier will be over 2,300 square feet and ADA compliant when it’s completed.

Lots of progress is happening as we continue to move towards the ultimate goal: a new Texas State Park!

New Year Resolutions

We have many goals for the new year.

Environmentally resourceful

One of them is to be as environmentally resourceful as we can. There’s a couple of ways we are working on that resourcefulness.

Firstly, we have solar panels set up on the top of our new maintenance building. With the area around the maintenance building cleared for the yard, there’s plenty of open sky to capture plenty of sun.

Secondly, our maintenance yard will also store our new food dehydrator. This tool will turn fish remains from our fish cleaning stations (not yet finished) into fertilizer to use throughout our park. This way we can repurpose, reuse, and recycle as much waste as possible.

Headquarters

A second resolution is to complete our Headquarters building, but that one will take a good chunk of the year to finish. Meanwhile, it’s been interesting to see everything that goes into planning this building and making sure it fits within the context of our park and our timelines. It’s exciting to see the progress!

Ranger Kate’s resolutions

My resolutions have to do with our interpretive program. I’m gathering supplies and planning future events.

Around the holidays, many parks have Christmas light events, where they encourage campers to decorate campsites with holiday cheer. I get giddy thinking about our park lit up with Christmas lights. I cannot wait to see folks bundled up with hot chocolate around the fire and hearing kids excited for Santa to visit. And what a joy it will be to participate in First Day Hikes again!

I’m getting too amped up thinking of all this. I need to go do more planning. I cannot wait to share all this when we finally open!

Kate Fisher is a Park Ranger and Park Interpreter at the soon to open Palo Pinto Mountains State Park. She writes a monthly newsletter to keep State park enthusiasts up to date on all the latest news about the park!