From a pad in Port Aransas you look out on a row of rigs parked behind the sand hills, a boardwalk climbing over the dunes to the beach and surf loud enough to hear through the open windows. That boardwalk is where the coffee goes first thing, while the kids race ahead to the water. By midday the sand is lined with trucks, umbrellas and fishing rods, because on Mustang Island the beach doubles as a road.
Getting here is part of the trip. The classic way onto the island is the ferry from Aransas Pass, a quarter-mile ride across the ship channel that TxDOT says usually takes under ten minutes, with longer waits in peak summer. Once you roll off, the week mostly stays put, with the air running in the rig, the beach out back and town a short ride away.
The beachfront RV resorts are where the rig sleeps. On The Beach RV Park has trails straight to the sand, a bathhouse and a fish cleaning house for whatever came out of the surf. Its newer big rig sites run full hookups on 50-amp service with room for the slide-outs. Gulf Waters RV Resort is on the beach too, with a pool, its own boardwalk over the dunes and golf carts to rent, and it stays open year-round.
Reserve the site before you book the rig. Tell the park how long the motorhome is, get the site confirmed for that length, and then rent a rig that matches it. The tourism bureau's RV resort list covers the island's other parks if these two are full.
Whatever park you book, buy a beach permit too. It's what lets the family drive down the sand past the mile markers to an emptier patch, and it also covers a few nights camped on the beach itself, the rig parked back from the water on its own tanks with the Gulf filling the windshield. If it's just two of you chasing those nights on the sand, a smaller rig built for two is easier to tuck in.
Farther down Mustang Island, Mustang Island State Park makes an easy day out among the dunes. Past the island's south end the coast runs on into Padre Island National Seashore, miles of open Gulf beach that the Corpus Christi RV page covers as its own trip.
Winter Texan months on the island
From October through March the island changes crowds. Winter Texans and snowbirds arrive for a month or more, and the RV parks start running like small neighborhoods, with potlucks, the game on the clubhouse TV and long beach walks in mild winter weather.
On The Beach RV Park's Winter Texan page lays out beachfront full hookups for stays of a month or longer, with community events through the season. Winter fills those monthly sites, so hold one before you rent anything. For a long stay, some listing owners will deliver a travel trailer to the site and set it up, which is arranged listing by listing and still needs a reserved site. If the island is full, the Texas RV page covers the rest of the coast for a winter stay.
Texas SandFest weekend in April
Every April, Texas SandFest turns the beach in front of town into an outdoor gallery, sculptures shaped from the sand itself with crowds wandering between them all weekend. Rigs line up in perpendicular rows facing the Gulf, close enough to walk over in the morning before the crowds arrive.
As of the 2026 festival, the SandFest FAQ allowed RVs only outside the bollards, parked perpendicular, for three nights at most. The festival's own lots took no RVs or trailers, and the remote lots allowed no overnight parking.
That weekend, the festival crowd and everyone else's spring beach week want the same pads on the island and the same rigs in the listings. Lock the site first, then the rig, and check the festival's page for next year's dates and parking rules before committing.
I.B. Magee Beach Park by the jetty
I.B. Magee Beach Park belongs to the city, and its RV sites sit by the jetty, where the ship channel meets the Gulf and people cast off the rocks from first light. The tourism bureau's beach page lists 64 RV sites with 20, 30 and 50-amp power, sewer, water and wifi, and no tent camping. The park's dump station, with city water to refill, is where to empty the tanks after a few nights camped on the sand.