The highway follows the Colorado from here most of the way to Austin, and the river is doing something unusual for a coastal-plain stream: it runs in a valley it cut for itself, with distinct terraces stepping down to the modern channel. Each terrace is an old floodplain, abandoned when the river cut deeper during a period of lower sea level, so the flats a mile back from the water are older river bottoms stranded above it. The Colorado runs about 860 miles from the Llano Estacado to Matagorda Bay and shares no water with the Colorado of the Grand Canyon.
Getting there
29.8000, -96.6800
Locations are approximate and may be inaccurate, on private land, or otherwise inaccessible. Check before you travel.
Hear it from the road
Whistlestop tells you this story automatically when you drive past. No searching, no tapping, nothing to ask.
