35 Scenic Drives to the Wades found in “Fly Fishing Austin”

The 35 free maps listed below were hand-built by Tom Herbertson, based on the driving directions provided by Aaron Reed in his book The Local Angler, Fly Fishing Austin & Central Texas published by Imbrifex Books in May 2020. All of the maps start in downtown Austin at the iconic bronze statue of Stevie Ray Vaughan at Auditorium Shores on Lady Bird Lake and provide the best driving routes to each of the 49 wades described by the author in the book. To make the maps more useful, Tom has combined directions to a few of the adjacent wades onto one map.

You can use these maps as is, or add your own additional points of interest by registering for a free account on RoadTripAmerica.com. If you don’t already have an account, you can register here. The account is free and allows you to customize, save, and share maps. Please read the instructions below this list for more info on how to use, customize, save, and share your maps.








**The numbers, below refer to the wade numbers in Aaron’s book, (e.g.: 001 is Wade #1)**
on the hook on stream
Scenic Drives to Wades in the Northern Waters

001 to 002 “Remote. No Pressure” and “Catfish Water” near Adamsville.

003 to 004 “Integrated Schools” and “Friends Territory” at the Old Maxdale Bridge in Killeen

005 “The Old Plantation” at the Stagecoach Inn in Salado,

006 to 007 “Sherrill Park” and “Mill Creek Golf Course”

008 “Brewery Reach” near Liberty Hill, Texas

009 to 010 “Riffles and Wildflowers,” and the “Goodwater Loop”

011 to 012 “Chandler Park” and “Mouth of the Middle Fork” near Chandler Park and Georgetown.

013 to 014 “San Gabriel Park” and “Katy Crossing” in Georgetown, Texas

015 Dinosaur Tracks near Leander, Texas.

016 River Down in Georgetown, Texas.

017 Wolf Ranch in Georgetown, Texas.



Scenic Drives to Wades in the Central Waters

018 The Pond at Champion Park near Cedar Park, Texas.

019 The Cemetery Wade near Hutto, Texas.

020 Norman’s Crossing near Taylor, Texas.

021 Town Lake Metropolitan Park in Austin, Texas.

022 — Montopolis Bridge. (Map updated 05/20/20, previously unavailable due to construction).

023 Prairie Paddle near Austin, Texas

024 Big Water Float near Webberville, Texas

025 The Bucketmouth Wade near Buda, Texas

026 The Camino Real Wade, near Manchaca, Texas.

027 to 029 Dog Park Blue, The Prettiest Quarter Mile and Wild Onion in Austin, Texas.

030 Below the Falls in McKinney Falls State Park.

031 to 033 Highway 71, Spur Trail Wade and Toll Road Paddle near Del Valley, Texas.


Scenic Drives to Wades in the Southern Waters

034 to 035 Carptopia and Deike Ranch Reach, near Hye, Texas.

036 to 037 Above the Falls and Trammell Crossing Reach in the Pedernales Falls State Park, near Johnson City, Texas.

038 Reimers Ranch in the Milton Reimers Ranch Park near Dripping Springs, Texas

039 The Old Man of the River Reach near Wimberley, Texas

040 to 041 Ranch Wade and Pioneer Town Paddle near Wimberley, Texas

042 The River’s End Reach at the Old Martindale Road Crossing in San Marcos, Texas.

043 The Martindale Dam Wade in Martindale, Texas.

044 The Green Mile near Spencer Canoes & Shady Grove Campground near Martindale, Texas.

045 South Trail Reach in Guadalupe Park in Canyon Lake, Texas.

046 Maricopa Wade near the Maricopa Riverside Lodge in Canyon Lake, Texas.

047 The Horseshoe near Whitewater Sports in New Braunfels, Texas.

048 The Hog Trough and Bear Creek near the Lazy L&L Campground in New Braunfels, Texas.

049 Old Camp Beans adjacent to Action Angler in New Braunfels, Texas.



General Instructions for using these maps

Please note that each map includes the described route from the book and 3-4 of the RTA attractions found along it, (if any have been loaded in this area, by RTA Mapping Contributors). You can add additional attractions from the book or points of interest of your own choosing to the maps.

After registering, you will be able to customize any and all of the 35 maps listed above by navigating to “Advanced Maps” (in the navigation bar at the top of every page) or clicking here.

    On the left hand column of the “Advanced Maps” page you will see some tables labeled as follows:

My Maps
My Custom Places
My Routes
My Drawn Routes
RTA Map Library — this is where you will find the list of maps that correspond to the routes in the book.

All the routes described in The Local Angler Fly Fishing Austin & Central Texas are labeled like this: West FFA-##-Wade Name, Closest Town (where ## represents the “wade” number associated with that map). So, the first one you will see in that list is called “West-FFA-01-02-Austin to Lampasas, Texas” The easiest way to see all 35 maps which provide the routes to each of the 49 “Wades” is to use the west-ffa in the keyword search box on the RoadTripAmerica.com MapCenter page.

If you click on the blue line under the number next to the word “West” it will open the link to the route.

Some key elements to note:

1. If you click on the blue flag labeled “1” you will find a description of the route and details about long it takes to drive this route.
2. The icons that have little colored flags are RoadTrip Attractions published by RoadTrip American contributing writers. They are not specifically related to Aaron Reed’s fly fishing book, but they are in the RTA Custom Maps database of attractions that are of unique interest to road trippers.

You can save this RTA Library map into your personal collection of maps. Here are some general instructions about how to do that:

To modify a RTA Library Map and Save it as one of your Personal Maps:

Click on the number link. At this point, you can add your personal Custom Places and then save whatever is on your screen as a map. Just click the “Save Map” button. The “Save Map” button is located about 20 lines below the map pane. From the left-hand side of the page you will see “Clear Map” “Map name” (this is where you enter the name you wish to save) “Map Tags” (this is used to make the search function work better) and “Save Map”. Once you have added your Map Name and clicked the Save Map button, the map’s name will now appear in the “My Maps” box in the left-hand column.

To create a new map based on the original RTA Library Map + some new places that you’d like to add, you will be using the RTA Custom Maps “Waypoints” system. The Waypoints system is explained in greater detail on the Advanced Maps page — look for MAP INSTRUCTIONS.

Once you have added any new Custom Places, you would save the new map that you just created. Note: The resulting blue line route might not follow the exact route of the RTA Library Maps because there is a limitation on the number of waypoints available (23 waypoints plus the beginning and ending locations) but you can use the RTA flags and your new Custom Places markers as those waypoints and choose your new starting and ending locations. The resulting map will be very similar to the original RTA Library Map. (For more information about using the “Waypoint” system, see post #1 in this thread.)

And if you need help with any of this, please get in touch with us via email to map.center.support@roadtripamerica.com. You can also join the map discussion on the Trip Advice Planning Forum.

Aaron Reed

Aaron Reed

Aaron Reed is an award-winning outdoor writer and Army veteran. He currently splits his time between his native Texas Gulf coast, where he drives a tugboat, and his home near the San Gabriel River in Georgetown, Texas. He is a founding member of the Texas Streams Coalition and has worked for the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department. In 2020, he was awarded the prestigious FFI Roderick Haig-Brown Award. When he is not working, chances are you can find him knee-deep in a stream somewhere around Austin, often with his wife and one or more of his three boys, trying like heck to become a better fly fisherman. His stories and photos have appeared in Southwest Fly Fishing, This is Fly, Kayak Angler, Texas Outdoors Journal, Texas Sporting Journal, Texas Fish & Game, Texas Parks and Wildlife magazine, Lone Star Outdoor News, Austin American-Statesman, Austin Business Journal, the Taylor Press, Soldiers magazine, Leatherneck magazine, Liguorian magazine, The Washington Times, and elsewhere.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

In order to comment, we have to collect some data:
This form collects your name, email and content so that we can keep track of the comments placed on the website. For more info check our privacy policy where you will get more info on where, how and why we store your data. Thanks for your cooperation and for making a comment here!

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.