Texas Rocks!
 When a retired Dallas hotel owner set up shop in the remote Texas Hill Country back in the early '90s, he expected to travel the world. Now the world has come to him...
Welcome to
Stonehenge II...
Texas is home to a lot of strange things. From half-buried Cadillac art in the desert to a full-size replica of China's Forbidden City, you'll find lots of weird and unusual sites in the Lone Star State.
But to the unwary backroads traveler of the Texas Hill Country, a replica of Stonehenge is about the last thing you expect to see as you wind your way through the scenic hills near Hunt, Texas.
Stonehenge II is the project of the Al Shepperd family, first started by Al senior, who passed away in 1994. As a retirement ambition and before his death, senior wanted to travel the world and "see all there was to see." He visited many of the great sites the world has to offer, and brought home with him the beginnings of an idea that started to take form when a Hill Country neighbor, contractor Doug Hill, gave him a huge limestone slab that was leftover after building a patio.
Al stood the slab upright in a pasture in front of his home, and the first monument stone was laid!
According to the Shepperd family, after that first slab was erected, Al senior wanted to make the slab more visible to passerbys on FM 1340, that fronted his property. So he consulted with neighbor Doug Hill again, and the two constructed an arch on top of the slab to "give it character."
 It not only gave the single slab character, it gave Al an idea. Remembering with fondness his visit to the real Stonehenge in the Salsibury plains of England, he and Hill set about completing what would become a Texas landmark.
The only real stone in the Stonehenge II monument, however, is the original slab. The other stones are actually a combination of steel, metal mesh and plaster, all anchored in cement. Painted and weathered, they're hard to tell from the real thing.
Standing about half as tall as the original monument, Stonehenge II has been attracting visitors from all across the state. And the Shepperd family, keeping with the wishes of Al senior, make the site accessible to the general public - no entrance fees, no sovernier shops and no parking fees. Children play hide-n-seek around the stones. Some families bring a picnic lunch, others just drive by slowly to view the spectacle.
To enhance the property, Shepperd and Hill decided to construct two large two replica Easter Island heads, or Rapa Nui, to provide him a constant reminder of his visit to the remote Chillean Islae during his world travels.
Like the original native carvings, Shepperd's figures have a forbidding look, with deep, hollow sockets, tightly pressed lips and a wide, sharp-edged jaw. Their ears, long and drooping, represent the island custom of wearing heavy ornaments that pull down the lobes.
Before his death, Shepperd visited many ancient sites in Alaska and had planned on building a Totem replica to add to his collection of world monuments, but the work was never completed.
 Stonehenge II is located just norhtwest of Kerrville, about an hour and a half northwest of San Antonio. If you're traveling Interstate 10, take any of the Kerrville exits and look for Texas Highway 27 that leads to Ingram. Turn left (the left-hand fork) in Ingram onto Texas Highway 39 and follow the signs to Hunt.
FM 1340 turns to the right in Hunt, just before you get to the Hunt General Store.
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Rio Grande Valley