23-25 Sep: Big Bend is a large park, including the very different habitats of desert, mountains, and river. We camped in Chisos Basin in the mountains, which was cooler than the low elevation areas near the Rio Grande. The campground is in a very scenic valley surrounded by mountain peaks and ridges, with the iconic formation known as Casa Grande towering above it. On one day we drove the Scenic Drive through desert terrain down to where the Rio Grande emerges from the sheer-sided Santa Elena Canyon. Roadside signs at pull-outs described the geology, ecology, and history of the area. We had thought of hiking the trail that goes part way into Santa Elena Canyon, but access to it was blocked by a flooded creek.
The next day we hiked Emory Peak, the highest mountain in the park. The Pinnacles Trail ascends first easily through grassy meadows, then more steeply via switchbacks directly under some large rock pinnacles to a saddle. The last part on the Emory Peak Trail climbs fairly gently along a ridge with good views south, with a final short ascent requiring scrambling very steeply up the rocky peak to the summit. Early on the hike we finally got a close look at a tarantula, which we only spotted fleetingly the day before crossing the road while we were driving. On the way up we hiked a while with a botanist consultant doing a special study of an endangered grass species for the park service. He pointed out several interesting plants as we hiked. One thing that impressed us was the quantity and variety of flowers this late in the season, probably blooming because of recent rainy weather. There were purple, yellow, blue, and white ones, but some of the bright red ones particularly caught our attention.
