Camp Tahuaya was founded in 1932. Named after the Tahuayans a tribe of the Wichita Indians. Camp Tahuaya is located on the Lampasas River, in Bell County, Texas. The camp is four miles south of Belton, Texas, off of Interstate 35. Leave IH 35 at the Tahuaya Road exit and follow Tahuaya Road west for one and a quarter miles.
The 147 acres that compose Camp Tahuaya provide one of the finest physical and program facilities of any Boy Scout camp in the nation. A deliberate effort has been made to maintain the camp in a setting of rustic isolation, yet provide the program resources needed by today’s Scouts.
In few sections of the country will you find a spot so appropriate for camping and at the same time so bountiful in the lore of history as around the sparkling springs of Camp Tahuaya. The site, according to historians, was the camp and burial grounds of a pre-historic race of people, Plainview Man, and later for the Indians of several tribes. It has also known the Spanish Conquistadors who built their forts and buried their gold at Camp Tahuaya. Legend says the Dining hall is build on top of an old Spanish fort.
There's also a unique trail that was a road for many historic people. Stephen F. Austin and Sam Houston are a few that used the Old Military Road, a part of the Chisholm Trail that passes through Camp Tahuaya. The ruts made by thousands of wagon wheels, arrowheads, natural stone fences, and the millrace of the Shanklin Mill are physical reminders of Camp Tahuaya’s heritage.
