| Difficulty: | Intermediate |
| Length: | 28 mi, three days, two nights |
| Water: | Leave tanks, tap water at east end |
The trail is a 28-mile hiking trail that winds through the Sabine National Forest. The Trail Between The Lakes extends from Lakeview Recreation Area on Toledo Bend Reservoir to US 96 within sight of the easternmost point of Sam Rayburn Reservoir. In a joint effort between the Golden Triangle Group of the Sierra Club and the USDA Forest Service, trail planning began in 1981, and the construction began in 1985. The final section of the trail was located and marked during the fall of 1990, but the group continues to work on the trail, and members have adopted sections to maintain. There are many points where trail comes close to road so water can be tanked. The trail is easy to follow, marked with 2" x 4" aluminum, rectangular-shaped tags which are attached to trees at a height of 5 feet above the ground in both directions. The Trail Between The Lakes is designated for hiking only; horses, off-road vehicles, and mountain bikes are not allowed. There are many opportunities to camp in primitive or natural settings along the route. Camping is not allowed in the Moore Plantation Wildlife Management Area during deer hunting season or in colonies of red-cockaded woodpeckers, which are an endangered species. Woodpecker colony boundaries are marked with aqua-green paint and boundary signs. The Forest Service asks that you please be careful with campfires, and if you "pack it in, pack it out" in other words, strict Leave No Trace ethics apply. This is a first class hiking trail and well worth several visits! The Lakeview area (Toledo Bend side) offers unique topography rising and falling over hill and valley. There is plenty of room to camp at either trail end on a late Friday night arrival.
Trip Dates: weekend in January 2000
We started Saturday morning from the west end of the trail, parked a car and shuttled the others. The rain was not as bad as we thought, and it was a pretty successful trip. We camped together between MP22 and MP21. The second day we walked north to the highway together and then the older scouts split off and went ahead. We camped again Sunday night and were finished by 12:00 Monday morning (it was a 3-day weekend). The Frogs made 12 miles, and the older scouts did the entire trail (13+ miles on the second day alone!). We recorded GPS lat-long coordinates of the mile markers along the trail. These are now posted on the US Forest Service web site for other hikers. Check out http://www.toledo-bend.com/national-forest/index.asp?request=waypt
We now have annotated topographic maps of the trip. Each of these maps has the mile markers noted on the maps. We need help with mile marker 22. If you find this one, please send us the coordinates. When we hiked this trail we only captured the waypoints (the mile markers). Later we reconciled an original survey map on which the trail was marked with the waypoints and then digitized the points between the mile markers. So the track on the map comes from the original survey map (which we used when we hiked the trail), not actual data from a trek. That said, it is still probably pretty close.
Click on a section of the map below to see the full size map.
