Austin East KOA Review & Rating

Austin East KOA Overview:

Review and Rating of Austin East KOA in Austin Texas

Located on 12 acres of heavily treed family-owned property that was used for longhorn cattle grazing, Austin East KOA is a great place to stay if you want to explore Austin and the surrounding area.  The Park is conveniently located close to highway 130 to take you north or south and highway 71 to go east or west into Austin.  Plus you're just 5 minutes from Rodeo Austin, Travis County Exposition Center, and Walter E Long Lake.  Even though you are close to all of that you'll feel like you're isolated in the country surrounded by trees and longhorns grazing on the other side of the perimeter fence.  It's very peaceful and quiet!

We love KOA's primarily because they are like a Marriott - you know what you're going to get and it's consistent between hotels.  All of the KOAs we've stayed in are clean and well maintained with good service and reasonable prices.  Austin East KOA follows that pattern plus the sites are level and spacious and there are several amenities.  The staff is outstanding - very helpful, friendly, and committed to their KOA and making sure guests have a memorable stay. 

The roads and sites are paved and big rigs shouldn't have any problem navigating into their site - a staff member escorts you to the site.  The roads throughout the park are a little rough because the owner used a "green" polymer product which was environmentally friendly, but it failed.  There are plans to repair and upgrade the roads in the near future.  

Austin East KOA currently has developed 12 of its 42 acres and over the next few years the rest of the acreage will be developed in two different phases with the first phase including 80 additional campsites.  

Amenities and Fun Things To Do:

At Austin KOA East there are 82 sites that are a mixture of back-in, long pull throughs, and tent sites.  There are some buddy sites, deluxe patio sites, a group tent site, and deluxe tent sites.  All of the sites are level, wider than normal, and have grass between each site.  Most sites have a couple trees for shade and each site has a patio with a picnic table and stone fire pit.  The majority of the sites are reserved for short-term stays and the rest are for extended or full-time stay. 

The sites are level and range from 51' to 75' long and about 20 to 25 feet wide - much wider than most other RV sites.  The pull-through sites have two sewer hook-ups (which makes for an easy connection without an extension) and conveniently located water, electricity (30 and 50 AMP), and cable hook-ups. Back-in sites are around the perimeter of the Park and back up to a fence and natural area.  On the other side of the fence are lots of trees and several longhorn steers.  During our stay, two of these longhorns had locked horns and were jousting back and forth for dominance.  One of the longhorns has an 8-foot horn span.

There are six tent sites each of which has a parking pad, a small pebble tent pad, picnic table, water and electric, and some have a small covered structure with a shelf that serves as a perfect place to set up a camping stove to cook some meals.

If you have friends joining you or you don't have an RV there are currently two cabins that sleep up to four available for rent.  Each of the cabins is one bedroom with a queen and a loft, microwave, coffee maker, refrigerator, deck, propane BBQ grill, glider rocker chairs - there is no stove or utensils.   More cabins will be added in 2020.

What also makes Austin East KOA an excellent RV Park for a weekend getaway are the amenities which include:

• free fast wi-fi and lots of cable channels
• heated and cooled swimming pool
• recreation room with glass garage doors that can open to nice deck with  a BBQ grill, chairs, and tables
• one of the best horseshoe pits and washer pits I've seen thanks to wood planking from one end to the other
• a playground and sandbox for the kids and a huge half-acre dog run for the dogs
• wood, ice, and propane for sale
• trash pickup at your site
• a store with a little bit of everything ranging from ice cream to milk to snacks and RV supplies
• laundry room with some industrial type washers and dryers
• clean private individual restrooms and showers

A Typical Texas Outsider Day:

We stayed at Austin East KOA because we were attending Waterloo Music Festival a few miles away and on another visit we stayed here to be close to Austin for the Austin Film Festival.  Three full days of music from 1 AM to 12 PM amd films kept us very busy with no time to do anything else. However, we did find time to play a round of golf at Jimmy Clay Golf Course before the films started one afternoon. 

Cool Nearby Activities:

Austin East KOA is a perfect location to camp and explore the Austin area. The Park is five minutes from the Travis County Exposition Center, Rodeo Austin and  12  miles from Circuit of the Americas. Walter E. Long Lake. is 3 minutes away and it's perfect for a picnic, swimming, fishing, or launching a boat.

Within 15 minutes you can be in downtown Austin enjoying everything that the "music capital of Texas" has to offer from biking trails to bat watching to a wide variety of restaurants plus kayaking or boating on Lady Bird Lake or Lake Austin, and of course lots of live music.  Check out this page on Austin and Fun Things to See and Do. 

The Colorado River is close and offers lots of paddling put-in points - see this web page to learn more.  If you like golf, there are some excellent Austin Golf Courses that are close by. 

Additional Pictures of Austin East KOA