The river downtown
Louise Hays Park stretches a mile along the Guadalupe in the middle of town, with paved trail, playgrounds, and shade. Rebuilt riverbank plantings from the 2025 restoration work came through the 2026 flood largely intact.
Kerr County
Kerrville & the Upper Guadalupe
A working river town on the upper Guadalupe — cypress-shaded parkland, Western art, and a fiercely tight-knit community that wants you to come back.
The place
Kerrville sits where the Guadalupe River is still young and clear, cutting through cypress and limestone bluffs. The town built its identity around that water: Louise Hays Park runs a mile along the bank downtown, the River Trail links it to Kerrville-Schreiner Park, and generations of Texas summer camps line the roads upstream.
That same river flooded catastrophically on July 4, 2025, killing 117 people in Kerr County, and again in July 2026. Recovery is ongoing and visible. Local officials have been direct about what helps: the town is open, and summer visitors are roughly a hundred million dollars of the county economy. Come, spend money here, and pay close attention to the weather.
Don't miss
- Walk the river trail through Louise Hays Park
- Museum of Western Art on Bandera Highway
- Camp or paddle at Kerrville-Schreiner Park
- Kerrville Folk Festival, late spring
Things to do
How to spend your time
Museum of Western Art
Since 1983, about 150 sculptures and 250 paintings of the American West, in a Southwestern building on Bandera Highway. Small enough to do properly in ninety minutes.
Kerrville-Schreiner Park
A 517-acre city park with cabins, RV and tent sites, 10-plus miles of hike-and-bike trail, and a river trailhead with kayak and canoe rentals.
Kerrville Folk Festival
Eighteen days of songwriters at Quiet Valley Ranch each May and June — one of the longest-running folk festivals in the country, and a genuine institution.
Plan it properly
Official sources for Kerrville & the Upper Guadalupe
Hours, fees, and closures change. These are the people who set them.
- Kerrville CVB
Official visitor bureau — what is open, and where to stay.
- Museum of Western Art
Hours, exhibitions, and admission.
- Kerrville Folk Festival
Eighteen days of songwriters at Quiet Valley Ranch.
- Guadalupe River State Park (TPWD)
Downstream near Spring Branch — check alerts before you go.
Pair it with
Experiences here
Trips through here
Ready-made itineraries
3 days · Autumn The Fall Color Run
Bigtooth maples at Lost Maples, cypress on the Frio, and a Cowboy Capital nightcap — the three weeks a year Texas does autumn properly.
- Kerrville
- Lost Maples
- Garner State Park
- Bandera
7 days · The whole region The Grand Tour
A week-long horseshoe from Boerne to Llano and back — caves, cowboys, wine, granite, barbecue, water, and a dance hall to finish.
- Boerne
- Bandera
- Kerrville
- Fredericksburg
- Llano
- Marble Falls
- Gruene
Nearby
More destinations close by
Lost Maples & the Sabinal Canyon
29.816°N 99.570°WBandera & Real Counties
A relict stand of bigtooth maples in a steep canyon on the Sabinal River — and the best fall color in Texas, for about three weeks a year.
Fredericksburg
30.275°N 98.872°WGillespie County
German roots, a Main Street of biergartens and shops, and the gateway to Texas wine country. The unofficial capital of the Hill Country.
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