I reached the Chisos Visitor Center at 5, the place is nearly 5 hours from the nearby Midland airport. I had to hike up the Laguna Meadows trail and part of the Colima trail in 3 hours to avoid hiking in the dark, in order to join my friends camping at Colima 3.

This wasn’t the best idea I have ever had. Turns out distances look deceptively small on a map and with 2 days worth of supplies on your back every feet of elevation hurts and every switchback decimates you. But then, after 2.5 hours of cursing when I finally unloaded my bag and set up my camp I found myself in a forest, on the top of a ‘mountain island’ in the middle of a desert and surprisingly in no pain.

Later that night I saw my first gorgeous sunset at the Big Bend, locked my food in a bear resistant food storage, slept for the first time in my new gear in a very windy and scary night and woke up at 4 to see the stars.

I would repeatedly come back to Chisos over the next week to hike, camp, and just stroll around.

Must See

Chisos mountain is the main hiking region in the Big Bend and this is the only place where you can backpack. The complement of Chisos is a vast shadeless desert, good for camping and night hiking but unforgiving for anything else.

• Southrim Trail and Emory peak
  These are without doubt the best hiking trails in Chisos. While doable in one day the standard way to do these is to camp on the mountain in the night.

• Windows Trail
  This trail is right next to the campgrounds, so the best way to do this is to camp there and hike one way during sunset and hike back when it gets dark.

• Lost Mine
  Being easily accessible and not too difficult, this is the busiest trail in the park. It’s best to do it early morning before the crowd comes it.

• Chisos Lodge Restaurant
  This is a miracle of nature. A restaurant serving cheap delicious food, right next to the visitor center.