Explore Lake Texoma

 Lake Texoma is one of the largest reservoirs in United States, and it sits across the border of  Oklahoma and Texas. The first time we visited Lake Texoma was about 10 years ago, during a trip to Hagerman Wildlife Refuge, which is at the southern tip of the lake, and then a year later to Eisenhower State Park, by the lake shore, near the Denison Dam. The lake has rocky shorelines with numerous coves at the park, great for kayaking on the water and hiking and camping along the shoreline.

Lake Texoma

In the past couple of years, since we bought the inflatable kayak Emma, Lake Texoma has become our most favorable place for outdoor activities, overtaking Lake Ray Roberts.  We went to Lake Ray Robert twice, and Lake Texoma 6 times! 

Most recently we went to Lake Texoma on May 1st, camping and hiking at Eisenhower State Park as usual. What was different this time is that we went beyond Park boundary to look for a new shoreline for kayaking. Looking at the map we decided to explore the Little Mineral Arm, a smaller finger of the lake, or a large cove, which is more than 4 miles away from Eisenhower State Park. To fully explore the little mineral arm, we drove to a boat ramp at the southern tip of little mineral arm.

The boat ramp at southern tip of little mineral arm, is a community boat ramp, one has to pay $10 for boat launch. We got there after a hearty lunch at La Catrina Street Tacos on the road from Eisenhower park.

The timing was perfect, the clouds broke apart, the Sun shone on us, and the passing clouds provided much needed shade from time to time, since we did not bring sunscreen. The exploration off the beaten path paid off. Away from major attractions, little mineral arm was very quiet that early Sunday afternoon, two boys were fishing on the pier near the boat ramp, a fishing boat was cruising in the water. 

The blue sky, white clouds and the green trees formed beautiful tapestries every direction we looked at. It was so quiet, the only sound we heard was from our own paddling, when we paused, we heard bird songs from woods on the shore, clear, crisp and sweet! A significant difference between the shoreline here and that at the state park is that the shore here is much less rocky, and some portions have red mud bank.

When we turned into the first small cove, it was full of green and the familiar sweet whistles from Northern Cardinal made us look around. It was not difficult to locate the bright colored bird! It looked at us curiously and kept chirping. Eventually it flew away into the green leaves.

As we paddled northward, close to the shore, we saw some small birds keep taking off the beach ahead of us. They camouflaged so well we could not see them unless they fly, they are sandpipers.

Some smaller egrets were spotted ahead on the shore and on the rocky beach, they were most likely to be snowy egret. As we got closer to them they flew away. A double crested cormorant perching on a log was startled, it ran on water a few steps during take-off. Turtles, sun bathing on logs as always, are a little bit different from turtles at other lakes of North Texas, their shells seem to be a bit brighter shade of green. A great heron flew over and stopped to rest on a snag. Not a great amount of bird during this Sunny afternoon, but changing scenes of the variety of birds in different settings, enthralled us.

sandpiper

The west shore of little mineral arm has houses,  piers, boat ramps, and buoys. A giant tire formed barrier at a small marina attracted turtles, gulls and shore birds. A different vista.

When we paddled into another cove, quit a few egrets large and small stood in the shallow water at far end, with a heron in the mix. We stayed at distance so not to disturb them. A couple more egrets flew in to join them, and a few minutes later, they took off, circled around and landed where they were.

Then a double crest cormorant was chasing a small light color bird, likely juvenile ring billed gull, over our heads, as we continued our return trip. The gull flew up and down with a couple sharp turns, the big black bird eventually gave up and flew away. The gull continued to circle over our heads and dipped into the lake a couple of times. When we passed the tire formed barrier again, a few ducks joined the gulls, turtles and sandpiper there. Later we witnessed 4 grand egrets lined up on the shore in large spacing in a cove, taking turns to wind surfing!!

This is one of longest kayaking we have ever had, both in time, about five hours on the water and in distance paddled, more than 8 miles! It is the best kayaking trip we have ever had.