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| Official NPS Map. Click and zoom in to enlarge for details. |
For our third and final day in the park we decided to take on the Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive. The drive is 30 miles total down to the Santa Elena Canyon, and there are a plethora of stops and hikes to check out along the way. Because one of the highlights of the park for some people is the Santa Elena Canyon, we decided to start by driving the whole length of the road and then stop on our way back up.
The Santa Elena canyon hike (red arrow on map) is fairly short but it a little tough, you start by finding your way across a river and then going up and over a rocky pass into the canyon. It is gorgeous though!
The high walls of the Canyon can really make you feel small.
Next we stopped at Dorgan House Trail (orange arrow on map), there was really hardly a hike here at all, mostly a walk out to the remnants of some old farm houses. We wanted to stop here because the ranger at the talk we attended in the Chisos Basin told us about the petrified wood fireplace. It was as cool as we hoped.
Next up was the Castolon Visitor Center (yellow arrow on map). There used to be a historic town in Castalon, however it burnt down in 2019 so they are currently operating out of a temporary structure. There wasn't a lot to see here, so we got our final stamp for the park and moved on.
The trail that we decided we were both the most excited about was the Chimneys Trails (green arrow on map). The trail connects 7 miles through the desert over to a non-paved road. However, the Chimneys themselves are 2.4 miles out and can the hike can be done as an out and back. The trail is relatively flat, but completely in direct sun light and seems like it would be brutal in the summer.
The Chimneys are very interesting rock structures sticking out of the desert. They were formed by magma seeping into cracks in other rock that has no eroded away, leaving only the mold of the cracks.
The reason we picked this hike though was the ancient Native American art at the base of the rocks.
The trail is also just a nice walk through the desert with great views of local flora and fauna.
After this hike we were pretty much ready to be done for the day. We stopped at the Lower Burro Mesa Pouroff trail (blue arrow on map) because it was short 1 mile out and back to get to the bottom of dry waterfall.
There is also a Upper Burro Mesa Pouroff trail that will get you to the top of the pouroff and looked very interesting. However that trail was longer, and we were starting to run out of time in the day. It is definitely on our list if we ever come back.
We made one last stop at the Sotol Vista (purple arrow) which looks out across the whole desert. It was lovely at dusk. Several people were setting up to watch the sunset, which promised to be beautiful, but we decided we wanted to keep moving and try to find our pullout before it got dark.
Overall it was a great day and a great way to finish up our time at Big Bend. We had big hopes for Big Bend and it didn't disappoint.
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