North Shore
- Right now
- Closedrecreation.gov lists every site closed this weekend, read 16:25 UTC
The place
the agency’s own description · what’s there · 5 notices
In the agency’s own words
North Shore Park is the largest day-use area on Wright Patman Lake, a 30,000-acre lake set amidst the piney woods of northeast Texas. With a sandy swimming beach, accessible boat ramp, reservable group picnic shelter and numerous other amenities, the park provides a fun, enjoyable day at the lake for a wide variety of visitors. Keep reading
Recreation
This facility provides easy lake access for boating and fishing activities, as well as plenty of on-shore fun. Picnickers enjoy swimming and relaxing on the beach. Children have plenty of options to keep busy, including basketball and sand volleyball courts, a playground and horseshoe pit.
Facilities
The group picnic shelter can accommodate up to 30 people. It is conveniently located next to a restroom with flush toilets and the swimming beach. There are 60 first come, first served picnic sites as well, though water and electricity are not supplied to these sites. There are no overnight campsites available in the park but Clear Springs Campground is one mile away.
Natural Features
The park overlooks the lake and is set among a thick forest on the sandy shoreline. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers manages approximately 55,000 acres of public forestland around the lake, providing habitat for wild turkey, bobwhite quail, squirrel, white-tailed deer, waterfowl and migrating bald eagles, pelicans and ducks. Some poisonous snakes inhabit the area.
Nearby Attractions
The Texarkana region is full of activities such as shopping, movies, restaurants and local historical sites. Shreveport, Louisiana offers river boat gambling, horse races and numerous festivals, including the Four State Fair and Rodeo and the Jump, Jive and Jam Festival.
What the agency tells you
This is a day-use area only; no overnight camping allowed
Visitors must pay a $5 day-use fee at a self-serve station at the entrance of the park. No cash is accepted, only card payments. Visitors can purchase a day pass ($5) or a voucher for an annual pass ($40) that can be redeemed at Clear Springs Park (1/2 mile from North Shore Park). Visitors are asked to display their pass so rangers can check for payment. Access to the boat ramp is separate and no fee is required for the boat ramp.
Park is open daily from 9 AM to Sunset from April 1 through September 30.
Everything else this campground posts · 2
Don't Move Firewood: Protect your forests from tree-killing pests by buying your firewood locally and burning it on-site. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.
STOP THE SPREAD OF INVASIVE SPECIES. Remove plants, seeds, animals, and mud from boots, gear, pets, and vehicles. Clean your gear before entering and leaving the recreation site. Stay on designated roads and trails, and follow local guidelines for firewood. CLEAN, DRAIN, DRY boats and any other recreational equipment that contacts water. Dispose of unwanted bait, worms, fish parts, or other organisms into the trash and not into the environment. For more information visit https://www.invasivespeciesinfo.gov/rec.
Facilities
- Toilets
- Flush Toilets
- “…It is conveniently located next to a restroom with flush toilets and the swimming beach. There are 60 first come,…”
- Boat ramp
- Yes
- Playground
- Yes
- Stay limit
- 14 nights
- recreation.gov facility rule maxStay
Around the campground
- On the water
- Lake, River, Beach
- Fishing
- Ranger programs
- Swimming
- Water sports
Nothing to book until it reopensread 16:25 UTC
recreation.gov lists every site closed this weekend
Every one of the next thirty nights is in recreation.gov’s record and not one site is being offered on any of them. That’s a campground closed or not yet released for booking, not a sold-out one.
Tell me when it reopens
Watch for it to come back
One email when the agency reopens it, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.
We check the agency’s own record once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time it stops saying closed.
Scanners that check every few minutes exist, and most of them charge. This one is free, it reads the same calendar, and it won’t always be first.
Every line of the receipt · 11
What you actually pay
Who keeps the booking fee
The agency’s own policy text says the reservation fee and the cancellation processing fee are “retained by the reservation service contractor”, and that a campground concessionaire will decline to refund them because “they did not receive these fees”. Recreation.gov is run under contract by Booz Allen Hamilton. What share of your booking fee the contractor keeps isn’t published in any federal dataset we can read, so we print no number for it. Our reporting on the contract →
How we know this receipt · 4
Why this page can’t say why
recreation.gov lists every site at North Shore closed this Friday and Saturday night. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has published no closure notice we hold, so this page can’t say why, and it won’t fill the gap with a guess. A closed night isn’t a sold-out one: the reservations its record still carries were taken before the sites were closed.
There’s no notice to quote and no reason to argue with, so this page offers you the watch and the list below, and no letter.
Open within 150 miles · 2
The agency’s own word that these are open, not our reading of a season.
- Cedar Lake Recreation AreaWinding Stair Mountain National Recreation Area · 102 mi
- Cove Lake Recreation AreaOzark National Forest · 133 mi · 36 sites
recreation.gov availability, read 16:25 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this
The sites
1 records · the site map
All 1 records
| NORTH SHORE | 001 | day use | 15 amp | yes | 428 ft | $30 |
The agency files 1 more record here that isn’t a site for the night. It files it as day use. It’s in the table above, marked for what it is, and it isn’t counted as a site.
Getting there
the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions · the phone number
Where it is
Clear Springs (TX)0.7 mi
Sportsman's Cove0.8 mi
Oak Park (Wright Patman Lake)2.7 mi
Piney Point4.1 mi
Rocky Point(Wright Patman Dam)4.9 mi
Malden Lake Campground11 miPhysical Address for North Shore Park:
Corps Road 13-A
Texarkana, TX 75501
From Texarkana, take U.S. Highway 59 south approximately 10 miles. Turn right on Farm-to-Market (FM) Road 2148 and travel approximately 1.5 miles to the Wright Patman Lake sign. Turn left and follow park signs to the entrance.
The weather
the next four days · the thirty-year normal
Next four days, and the thirty-year normal
Forecast
NWS forecast for Redwater, TX
Typical weather
Typical October night 54°F, day 76°F.
Coldest month of the year: typical January night 35°F. Bring the bag rated for it.
Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or more
A normal is the 1991-2020 average for the month, not a forecast: about half of all Julys are colder than the July line. The seven-day forecast above answers the other question.
The land, and who answers for it
who answers for it
Who answers for this land
North Shore is in Texas’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Nathaniel Moran (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →