Buescher State Park Gives Smithville a Quiet Lost Pines Lake

Buescher State Park sits east of Bastrop, tucked closer to Smithville, and it feels like the quieter sibling in the Lost Pines pair. There is a 30-acre lake, nearly six miles of forest trails, cabins, group facilities, and room to fish, paddle, hike, bike, or sit under the trees for a while.

The park has a good origin story too. The Buescher family donated 318 acres by 1936, and the heirs later donated 318 more. The state acquired the rest from the City of Smithville. The park opened in 1940, and its present size is 1,016.7 acres.

The Civilian Conservation Corps left more than scenery here. CCC workers built the lake and dam, a hiking trail, group facilities, and other park pieces. That gives Buescher a handmade feel, not just a pine-woods feel. The lake and dam, historic group facilities, hiking trail, and old stonework all carry the same New Deal-era park story.

For someone who knows Bastrop County mostly through Highway 71, Buescher changes the mental map. The county's piney side does not stop at Bastrop. It keeps going toward Smithville, quieter and a little more tucked away. That makes the park a good reminder that the Lost Pines have more than one center of gravity.