By E. Dan Klepper

There’s a lot of ground to cover in Texas and many marvelous opportunities for great hiking within our boundaries. The following excerpt from my upcoming 100 Classic Hikes in Texas (The Mountaineers Books, 2009), offers a good place to start. The trails will take you from rolling plains to high desert mountains and from blackland prairies to the subtropics.

Franklin Mountains State Park

West Cottonwood Spring to Mundy’s Gap Trail

At more than 24,000 acres, Franklin Mountains State Park is the largest urban wilderness park in the country.  It provides a momentary respite from the binational sprawl that constitutes the El Paso/Juárez/Las Cruces corridor. Hikers will find the West Cottonwood Spring trailhead at the Tom Mays Unit of the park a good place to start. The trail offers peaceful views and a solid rock shield against civilization.

Franklin Mountains State Park, Tom Mays Unit, El Paso; 915/566-6441;www.tpwd.state.tx.us/franklin.

Brazos Bend State Park

40-Acre Lake Trail

Brazos Bend State Park provides hikers with an opportunity to travel through lake, marshland, and forest environments. This blending of ecosystems that includes prairie to woodland, woodland to marsh, and marshland to lake widens the allure of this wild land. The 40-Acre Lake Trail, a 1.2-mile path around one of the park’s several lakes, straddles both lake and marsh and carries hikers through prime alligator habitat.

Brazos Bend State Park, Richmond; 979/553-5101; www.tpwd.state.tx.us/brazosbend.

Big Bend Ranch State Park

Ojito Adentro Trail

Spring areas in the Chihuahuan Desert often offer trekkers long, uninterrupted vistas of distant but welcome water sources. Such is the nature of the trailhead to Ojito Adentro (“the little spring within”). The trail provides hikers with a view of shady mesquites, migrant owls and a fern-covered grotto that features a small waterfall. The trek requires some negotiating while boulders force a tight squeeze and a bit of scrambling, but the resulting view is a stunner.

Sauceda Ranger Station, Big Bend Ranch State Park, Presidio; 432/ 358-4444; www.tpwd.state.tx.us/bigbendranch.

Monahans Sandhills State Park

Dune Hike

The Monahans Sandhills represent a small portion of a vast dune-field extending 200 miles from Monahans northwest into New Mexico. The area around Monahans Sandhills State Park features barren, but active dunes with some as high as 70 feet. With a total of 3,840 acres, hiking in the park consists of simply setting out across the dunes and exploring at will.

Monahans Sandhills State Park, Monahans; 432/943-2092; www.tpwd.state.tx.us/monahanssandhills.

Dinosaur Valley State Park

Nature Trail

Dinosaur Valley State Park has an excellent trail system that can be enjoyed by both hikers and mountain bikers. The Nature Trail provides an opportunity to traverse the shallow Paluxy River and study some of the most clearly defined dinosaur tracks in the state.  In addition to the authentic dinosaur tracks, the 45-foot Tyrannosaurus and 70-foot Apatosaurus fiberglass models, manufactured for the 1964-65 New York’s World Fair, provide pure entertainment.

Dinosaur Valley State Park, Glen Rose; 254/897-4588; www.tpwd.state.tx.us/dinosaurvalley.

Muleshoe National Wildlife Refuge

Nature Trail and Upper White Lake Overlook

Muleshoe National Wildlife Refuge is the oldest national wildlife refuge in Texas, established in 1935 as a link in a chain of migratory flyways. This particular refuge is the wintering grounds for thousands of sandhill cranes. Visitors may get a chance to view the cranes by following a nature trail that departs from the primitive camping area and parallels the western shore of Upper White Lake.

Muleshoe National Wildlife Refuge, Muleshoe; 806/946-3341; www.fws.gov/southwest/refuges.

Daingerfield State Park

Rustling Leaves Nature Trail

The entire 501-acre Daingerfield State Park has a timeless beauty that feels more like something out of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula than Texas. The Rustling Leaves Nature Trail leads you through a forest of hardwoods and sassafras that surrounds an 80-acre, spring-fed lake. The trail continues to the Dogwood Camping Area and ultimately ends at the swim beach.

Daingerfield State Park, Daingerfield; 903/645-2921; www.tpwd.state.tx.us/daingerfield.

Galveston Island State Park

Clapper Rail Trail and Spur

A hike down the Clapper Rail Trail at Galveston Island State Park reveals the subtle changes that occur along the bays and bayous of Galveston Island.   While navigating over land that seems to have just appeared from beneath the sea hours earlier, you can see blue crab and flounder, as well as spoonbills and Harrier hawks.  At the end of the trail, the nearby interpretive center provides a closer examination of the area’s marine life.

Galveston Island State Park, Galveston; 409/737-1222; www.tpwd.state.tx.us/galveston.

Before you go, check out the essentials!

See the full article in the September 2008 issue.

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