Honey Creek's New Trailhead Opened in August. By October, One Loop Was Left.

On Aug. 8, 2026, Honey Creek State Natural Area opened a trailhead anyone can walk without a guide. The SNA has been open for limited access since 1985, and for most of that time the main way in was a ranger-led walk down to the creek. Eight weeks later, on Oct. 1, Texas Parks and Wildlife closed two of the three new trails. Only the shortest one, a 0.7-mile loop, is still open.

That leaves Spring Branch with an odd fall. Next door, Guadalupe River State Park has cut back to four trails open to foot traffic. So the newest trailhead in the complex has become one of the few reliable places to walk. Its smallest loop was built as the starting point. This October it is most of what's open.

A new way in, after four decades of guided walks

The land behind the new trailhead is the former Honey Creek Ranch. The Friends of Guadalupe River State Park and Honey Creek SNA wrote that it took years of negotiation between former owners Terry and Ronnie Urbanczyk, Texas Parks and Wildlife, and the Texas Nature Conservancy before the state closed on the purchase on May 31, 2023. That added 515 acres to the SNA. Three more years of planning followed before the gates opened. Complex Manager Brandon Lopes-Baca called it the first publicly accessible part of Honey Creek SNA since TPWD acquired property there from The Nature Conservancy in 1985.

The Friends newsletter's fall issue counts four ways into the SNA now, and it notes they get confused easily:

1. The main Guadalupe River State Park entrance, with parking at the Rust House, for the long-running guided walks down to Honey Creek itself.
2. Spring Branch Road, for the Doeppenschmidt-Weidner farmstead on the southeast side of the creek.
3. The old ranch entrance off Highway 46, marked by a decorative steel gate the Urbanczyks put in.
4. The new paved entrance off Park Road 31, about half a mile from Highway 46, just before the main park entrance.

If you want to hike the new trails, use the fourth one.

What the new section was built to hold

The trails were built as a nested system. Box Turtle is a 0.7-mile loop that starts and ends at the parking lot, with a crushed-granite surface and mostly level grades. It also leads to Roadrunner, a loop that adds about 1.7 miles, which in turn leads to the Karst Loop, about 1.0 mile more. TPWD's announcement said the trailhead gives access to 3.5 miles of trail. The park page and the Friends newsletter both say 3.6. Either way, it's about three and a half miles, through the oak savanna that drains into Honey Creek.

The rules for this section differ from the ones many locals know from the guided walks:

• Reservations only. Book through the TPWD website, the call center or an on-site QR code. You'll get the gate code in your confirmation email. Passes are not sold on site.
• Hours are 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.
• Leashed dogs are allowed on the new trails. Dogs other than service dogs are still not allowed on the walks down to the creek.
• There's a restroom but no water refill station, so bring all the water you'll need.

What October left open

TPWD's Oct. 1 alert closed Karst Loop and Roadrunner. Box Turtle stays open to foot traffic only. The alert gives no reason and no reopening date.

That leaves about a fifth of the new section's mileage open.

Guadalupe River State Park has shrunk in a similar way. Since Oct. 1, the only trails open there are Bald Cypress, Discovery Center Loop, River Overlook and Bauer, all foot traffic only. TPWD cites debris and safety hazards and asks visitors not to create or use social trails. The Friends newsletter says the river flooded the park this July, the second major flood there in two summers. Staff reopened the river Day-Use Area as soon as conditions allowed.

The main park also has a few active alerts worth checking before you go. A burn ban has been in place since Aug. 21, and only containerized fuel stoves are allowed. A water-conservation alert from July 21 asks visitors to bring their own drinking water. As of Oct. 2, the park's phones were down, and staff asked visitors to send questions through social media. Check TPWD's Guadalupe River State Park alerts page and the Honey Creek alerts page on the morning you plan to go.

The short loop and the creek walk carry the season

Box Turtle was designed as the accessible trail, so it suits this October better than a longer loop would. The Friends newsletter is frank that pushing a manual wheelchair nearly three-quarters of a mile is strenuous. The park now has an Axis Trackchair, a motorized all-terrain wheelchair bought by the Friends group. The newsletter said it would be ready to reserve, free of charge, in early September. To ask about using it, the Honey Creek park page lists 830-438-2656.

The new trails never went down to the water. TPWD's announcement describes them as exploring the watershed and points visitors who want to see Honey Creek itself to the guided hike from Guadalupe River State Park. TPWD lists that walk on four Saturdays this month: Oct. 10, 17, 24 and 31. Hikers meet outside the Rust House for a moderate walk of about two miles that takes around two and a half hours, and the October listing asks you to register by email. The park's general page still says hikes are limited to the first 18 people who arrive, to protect the creek. Call ahead to confirm which rule applies on your date.

The guided walk is changing too. The Friends group says TPWD has cleared interior renovations at the Rust House, about 95 percent of the materials are ordered, and the complex maintenance crew will do the installation. The newsletter also says a Poetry Table with a poem by Jenny Browne, former poet laureate of Texas and of San Antonio, will be installed by the Discovery Center by next spring.

Saturday, Oct. 24 is the crowded one

Four of the five October Saturdays have a creek walk. On the 24th, a lot more lands on the same day. At Guadalupe River State Park, the Prairie Trail, equestrian parking and overflow parking close from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. that day. Elsewhere nearby:

• Bulverde Market Day runs 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at 2545 Bulverde Road, FM 1863, with room for 35 tent vendors and three food trucks. An earlier market is set for Oct. 10 during the same hours. The Bulverde Spring Branch Chamber lists it as part of a recurring market held on the second and fourth Saturdays.
• The Bulverde Pumpkin Patch at 3800 West Ammann Road holds its fall festival Oct. 24 and 25. The patch is open all month, Oct. 1 to 31.
• Musik in the Park at Bulverde Community Park, 29815 Bulverde Lane, is free and features Replay that evening.
• Fall Fun & Pumpkin Carving at the Canyon Lake Heritage Museum is free and runs 4 to 6 p.m., co-hosted by Tye Preston Memorial Library.

The next Saturday, Oct. 31, the same Bulverde Road market site hosts a kids-only market from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Vendors must be 17 or younger and accompanied by an adult.

The window narrows after Halloween

Both parks close to the public for permitted hunts twice this season, from 8 p.m. Nov. 20 to noon Nov. 24, and from 8 p.m. Jan. 11 to noon Jan. 15. Only permitted hunters can enter on those dates. The first closure covers the weekend before Thanksgiving.

Two nearby options can fill out a weekend while the park trails stay limited, and one of them has a deadline. Comal Park, at 1178 Comal Park Road in Canyon Lake, has a 1.2-mile walking trail and is open daily in October from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., with last entry at 4:30. Its 2026 season ends Oct. 31. Canyon Lake Gorge, run by the Guadalupe-Blanco River Authority, has been on fall hours since Sept. 8. It's open Monday through Saturday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., with last entry at 3:30. Guided tours run Tuesday through Saturday, according to the Canyon Lake Gorge tours site.

TPWD's August announcement called the trailhead the first part of a multi-phase plan for the SNA. A Public Use Plan presented at public meetings in Bulverde and New Braunfels on July 22 and 23 will guide later phases. For now, the open part of Honey Creek is a 0.7-mile crushed-granite loop off Park Road 31, open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. by reservation.

Access to Honey Creek and the Guadalupe is part of what defines daily life around Spring Branch, and it's part of how we talk with clients about land and acreage here. If you'd like to talk through how the park complex fits into your plans for a Spring Branch property, Rutter Realty Group is glad to help. Schedule a Confidential Consultation.