Where to put 24 people in Martindale, Texas

If you're a big group with the historic strip on Main Street in mind, the one place we can speak for first-hand is our own: Pool, Hot Tub, Dock & Gym | Riverfront Retreat, which locals and our repeat guests know as Hilco. It is a private riverfront estate in Martindale with three separate homes on it, a four-bedroom main house plus two casitas, sleeping up to 24 people across six bedrooms. We built it because we are a family of six and we kept running into the same problem on group trips: either everyone is stacked into one house with a single bathroom queue, or the group splits across town and nobody actually sees each other.

Martindale itself is the reason this works. The town is small enough that a group staying anywhere in it is a few minutes' drive from the red brick buildings on Main, and quiet enough that the loudest thing most afternoons is a kayaker drifting past the dock.

Three roofs, one driveway, and why that matters at 24 people

The layout is the point. A main house with four bedrooms, plus two private casitas, means a group of 24 can have dinner at one long table and then scatter to three front doors. Grandparents who go to bed at nine and a graduating class who don't are not the same houseguests, and Hilco was designed around that. Twelve beds across six bedrooms, four bathrooms between them.

Who it tends to suit:

• Multi-generational families who want the little kids napping somewhere other than the room where the card game is happening
• Two or three families travelling together, each with a door to close
• Friends floating the river, where the whole trip is really about one long dinner that runs past dark
• Wellness and corporate groups, who get the gym in the workshop and a dedicated workspace with wifi
• Graduation and milestone weekends that want a kitchen and a fire pit rather than a banquet room

A note on logistics that catches groups out: parking at Hilco is capped at six vehicles, and street parking isn't allowed in the neighbourhood. For 24 people that means carpooling from wherever you're driving in from, and it's worth sorting before anyone leaves the house.

The river is private, and that changes the day

The San Marcos is spring-fed, clear and cool year round, and the stretch in front of the estate has no public access nearby. You get your own dock for the length of the stay. Swim off it, fish from it, put in a kayak, or sit on the bank and let the afternoon go. Occasionally a floater drifts by and that's the traffic.

This matters more than it sounds, because the river through Martindale is a busy thing in summer. Outfitters like Texas State Tubes and Don's Fish Camp run the stretch out of San Marcos, and Pecan Park sits downstream as a put-in for the quieter, cypress-lined floats. The run down from San Marcos to Martindale takes somewhere between two and four hours depending on how much water is moving. Plenty of groups do exactly that and then come back to a dock nobody else is using.

What there is to do without leaving the gate

Between the three homes: a pool and a hot tub, a fire pit, an outdoor kitchen and dining area, a functional fitness gym in the workshop, a playground and a trampoline for anyone under twelve, and a hammock for whoever claims it first. There's a crib and a high chair, which saves a family with a toddler the worst part of packing. Pets are welcome.

Two honest things about a true Texas riverfront property. Wildlife and insects come with the setting, pest control notwithstanding, so there's insect repellent in the house. And quiet hours run from nine at night to eight in the morning. This is a river community of neighbours, and Hilco isn't a party house: respectful gatherings, registered guests only.

Getting to the historic strip and the rest of it

Martindale's old core runs down toward the river, a short brick-fronted run of buildings that most people driving Highway 80 between San Marcos and Luling never notice. The Martindale River Cafe and Mercantile on Main does deli sandwiches and charcuterie, with picnic tables across the street looking over the water where live music turns up. The Martindale Schoolhouse, built in 1921 and a Texas Historical Landmark, sits on a street off the river and works as an event venue alongside the Social Hall. Duett's Texas Club has a stage indoors and another on the patio.

From the estate, dining, live music and shopping are about ten minutes out. Beyond that:

• San Marcos is the nearest city, seven miles northwest. Rio Vista Park and Texas State are both under ten minutes' drive, and the outlet mall a few minutes past that.
• Lockhart sits about eleven miles the other way, the barbecue end of the day trip.
• Luling is a little further on, around seventeen miles.
• Austin-Bergstrom is roughly forty minutes if people are flying in.

Interstate 35 is about eight miles off, which is why Martindale feels further from everything than it actually is.

Other places in town, and when we'd point you elsewhere

We manage one property here, so this isn't a roundup and we won't pretend otherwise. What we can tell you is the shape of the local market, because we know who our neighbours are. The Martindale Schoolhouse offers accommodation alongside its event business, and there are lofts above the historic storefronts on Main for people who want to be in the middle of it. If your group is small and the whole point is walking out your door onto the old strip, that's a different trip from ours, and you should book it.

Hilco is for the group whose trip is really about the water and the table. If you want 24 people in one place with a private stretch of the San Marcos at the bottom of the lawn, and a drive of a few minutes when you want the cafe or the music, that's what this estate does. We don't live in Martindale, but we're usually about an hour away and we answer our phone.

Before you book

Dates go first in summer, and a group of 24 moves slowly, so pin the weekend before you poll the group chat. Worth deciding early: who's driving (six vehicles, no exceptions), whether you're floating with an outfitter or just swimming off the dock, and who's cooking. The kitchen, the outdoor kitchen and the long tables are set up for a group that feeds itself, and the groups who plan one proper dinner together always say that was the night.

Nightly rates vary by season and length of stay. Message us with your dates and your head count and we'll tell you straight whether the estate fits what you're planning.