SAN ANTONIO – When Darrin Hammons looks outside the windows at Equinox Inn, she says she can only see a sliver of water in Canyon Lake.
“We’ve definitely noticed a drop,” Hammons said.
Hammons and her husband, Keith, own and operate the bed and breakfast just south of the lake. With record-breaking heat and ongoing drought, business owners across Comal County were concerned about what tourism would look like in Summer 2023. But the Canyon Lake Area Chamber of Commerce said they still saw business.
Hammons said since her inn doesn’t focus its business around the lake, she didn’t see many changes this summer.
“So many of our boat ramps are closed because the boats can’t enter the water safely. So that has put a strain on some of the outfitters that we refer people to,” Hammons said. “June, July and August were all our best months outside of 2022.”
Nikki Orsak is a board member of the Canyon Lake Area Chamber of Commerce. She said the chamber learned a lesson in the summer of 2022 to focus promotional efforts on the Canyon Lake community outside of the lake itself.
“A lot of our business is rooted in small-town, old-fashioned business,” Orsak said. “I think what it’s done is it’s really pushed people outside their comfort zones out here to kind of look for other things to do.”
Hammons said while what’s to come is still unwritten, she’s eager for the fall and winter season.
“I just like to take care of people,” Hammons said.
