Probably the most popular river destination in Texas, the Lower Guadalupe River between Canyon Lake and New Braunfels is renowned for its cool water, exciting rapids and great trout fishing. In the summer people flock to the river to enjoy tube floating, rafting and paddling. In the cooler months it is the southernmost trout fishery in North America. This Lower Guadalupe Pocket Guide has all the detailed information you need to prepare a leisurely family weekend, a whitewater adventure or a day of fly fishing for trout. It is designed with a full-color visual layout that allows you to meticulously plan out your trip, aid you with navigation and track your progress down the river.

For more than forty years, Wayne H. McAlister has canoed the Guadalupe River, sometimes called the “top recreational river in Texas.” In Paddling the Guadalupe, he guides readers down this 400-mile river whose waters spring from the limestone of the Hill Country in Kerr County, meander across the broad Coastal Plain, and finally empty into the Gulf of Mexico at San Antonio Bay. With the expertise of a life and career immersed in nature, he introduces readers to the places, people, plants, and animals—large and small, aquatic and terrestrial—that depend on the Guadalupe for either their livelihoods or their existence. With affection and humor (and sometimes aggravation), he wryly comments on the development and human activity along the river’s course, from the headwaters west of Kerrville to its mouth near Tivoli, just east of Refugio. For the traveler, either on the river or along its course, McAlister’s knowledge of the grists, sawmills, dams, bridges, swimming holes, and reservoirs bring the history of familiar towns—Comfort, Canyon Lake, New Braunfels, Seguin, Gonzales, Cuero, and Victoria among them—to life. His love of the natural world, which shares the river’s bounty, will inspire and enhance anyone’s experience of the Guadalupe, from the serious canoer to the family vacationer. Photographs taken over many years provide an intimate perspective, and sixteen maps help orient those interested in getting to know the river on a more personal basis. To learn more about The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment, sponsors of this book's series, please click here.

The San Marcos River Pocket Guide has all the detailed information you need in a full-color, visual layout to help you plan your next trip, aid you with navigation and track your progress down the river. The San Marcos River is popular with the summer crowds looking to escape and relax in the cool, clear water that flows out of Spring Lake. Those seeking to play can paddle down the river's series of exciting rapids. Downriver, its swift water twists through stretches that are jammed with logs and can challenge even the hardened competitors of the annual Texas Water Safari. Others come for a peaceful afternoon on the Luling Paddle Trail or to try their luck on one of Texas' best fishing rivers. From the city of San Marcos all the way to Gonzales, this river has something for everyone. Includes 85.7 miles of the San Marcos River and 4.7 miles of the Guadalupe River. Easy-to-use shuttle matrix for planning your next trip. 30 extensively detailed river maps. Information on 33 public access points.

The Lower Colorado River is generally wide and flat as it meanders its way down toward the Gulf of Mexico, making it well-suited to casual paddlers and bass fishermen. The section of the river between Austin and Bastrop is especially popular due to its proximity to downtown Austin. Whether you are looking to take a multiday paddling excursion or just go out for an afternoon float trip with the kids, the Lower Colorado River Pocket Guide has all the detailed information you need. It's designed with a full-color visual layout that allows you to meticulously plan out your trip, aid you with navigation and track your progress down the river.

In a town deep in the Florida Everglades, where high school football is the only escape, a haunted quarterback, a returning hero, and a scholar struggle against terrible odds. The loamy black “muck” that surrounds Belle Glade, Florida once built an empire for Big Sugar and provided much of the nation's vegetables, often on the backs of roving, destitute migrants. Many of these were children who honed their skills along the field rows and started one of the most legendary football programs in America. Belle Glade’s high school team, the Glades Central Raiders, has sent an extraordinary number of players to the National Football League – 27 since 1985, with five of those drafted in the first round. The industry that gave rise to the town and its team also spawned the chronic poverty, teeming migrant ghettos, and violence that cripples futures before they can ever begin. Muck City tells the story of quarterback Mario Rowley, whose dream is to win a championship for his deceased parents and quiet the ghosts that haunt him; head coach Jessie Hester, the town’s first NFL star, who returns home to “win kids, not championships”; and Jonteria Willliams, who must build her dream of becoming a doctor in one of the poorest high schools in the nation. For boys like Mario, being a Raider is a one-shot window for escape and a college education. Without football, Jonteria and the rest must make it on brains and fortitude alone. For the coach, good intentions must battle a town’s obsession to win above all else. Beyond the Friday night lights, this book is an engrossing portrait of a community mired in a shameful past and uncertain future, but with the fierce will to survive, win, and escape to a better life.

The South Llano River, which rises from over a thousand springs about 26 miles upstream from Junction, is a classic "plunge and pool" waterway, alternately running over a narrow, shallow, rocky bottom creating mild rapids and then emptying into deep, calm pools. The river begins in deep canyons where springs gush from the steep banks. From there it flows northerly and eventually gives way to the valley floor and through the pecan-forested bottomlands that are the special feature of the South Llano River State Park. Best known as a year-round paddling river, it is also home to the only pure strain of Guadalupe Bass in the world. So whether you want to paddle, fish, or both, the South Llano River Pocket Guide has all the detailed information you need in a full-color, visual layout to help you plan your next trip, aid you with navigation and track your progress down the river.

Growing up near the Sabine, journalist Wes Ferguson, like most East Texans, steered clear of its murky, debris-filled waters, where alligators lived in the backwater sloughs and an occasional body was pulled from some out-of-the-way crossing. The Sabine held a reputation as a haunt for a handful of hunters and loggers, more than a few water moccasins, swarms of mosquitoes, and the occasional black bear lumbering through swamp oak and cypress knees. But when Ferguson set out to do a series of newspaper stories on the upper portion of the river, he and photographer Jacob Croft Botter were entranced by the river’s subtle beauty and the solitude they found there. They came to admire the self-described “river rats” who hunted, fished, and swapped stories along the muddy water—plain folk who love the Sabine as much as Hill Country vacationers love the clear waters of the Guadalupe. Determined to travel the rest of the river, Ferguson and Botter loaded their gear and launched into the stretch of river that charts the line between the states and ends at the Gulf of Mexico. To learn more about The Meadows Center for Water and the Environment, sponsors of this book's series, please click here.