The badlands of West Texas are among the most thinly settled lands in the country. Sparse and desolate, this region west of the Pecos is nearly uninhabited. Only 5000 people occupy the 8000 square miles that stretch between the Guadalupe Mountains on the Texas-New Mexico border and the Rio Grande. It is a land unsuited for agriculture or even grazing, with little grass or fertile land. What water there is can be salty and unpalatable, as likely to cause digestive distress as to quench thirst. Few will feel completely at home here.

An astounding view in Guadalupe Mountains National Park.

A Guadalupe Mountains Trip Begins

I was making the drive from the El Paso airport back to my camp in Guadalupe Mountain National Park. In the passenger seat next to me was Strider, a hiker attempting the Great Plains Trail – a route from Texas to Montana via New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Nebraska, the Dakotas and Montana. It's still a route, not a trail, and not a well-defined route at that. The Great Plains Trail Association was providing him with logistical support across the stretches of waterless country and private lands in New Mexico.

He sat silently, answering my occasional questions but asking none himself, staring out at the landscape. Strider is from Minnesota. He had hiked the North Country Trail, which stretches 4600 miles between South Dakota to New York. But he had never hiked the desert, and I couldn't blame him for feeling a bit uneasy when he got a close-up look at what the Chihuahuan had to offer.

It was mid-February, and years of drought had turned the creosote and rabbitbrush a sere and uniform brown, imposing a degree of monotony not found in other deserts. The Sonoran Desert abounds in a stylish diversity of cacti that lend shape, color, and relief to the landscape. The Mojave is much more sparse and much less diverse, but its sparseness opens up a bounty of rock and sand gardens that invite the explorer. The Chihuahua is neither lush nor open nor diverse. The land merely rolls in long indifferent brown waves which evoke the ancient Permian sea that once covered it.

The sea of scrub breaks finally against the walls of the Guadalupe Mountains, an ancient limestone reef rising 3,000 feet and more above the desert floor. At 8749 feet, Guadalupe Peak is the highest point in Texas. The sheer towers of the peak stand like a lighthouse in the desert, a beacon for travelers on business honest or otherwise. It is the easternmost of the sky islands that punctuate the southern deserts of the U.S., stretching from Mt. San Jacinto eastward, like an archipelago scattered in a sea of sand and brush. I grew up in southern Arizona, surrounded by these islands – the Santa Catalinas, the Rincons, the Santa Ritas – which harbor lush shady springs at their feet and rise up to support towering forests of majestic ponderosa pines along their crests. As a boy I spent many dreary schoolroom hours staring out at them, daydreaming of climbing their rocks and following their canyon streams. Like any other islands, the sky islands seemed to me a place of escape and mystery, an exotic landscape that begged to be explored.

We arrived at the Pine Springs Campground, and Strider day-hiked to the top of Guadalupe Peak that evening, carrying his full pack even though he would be returning to spend the night. He was starting the hike on his own terms. I had stashed some water at the Five Points Vista some forty trail miles to the north. Once started, he would not need my help for a few days and so I had the opportunity to explore the Guadalupe sky island on my own.

After seeing Strider off the next morning, I walked down to the visitor center to get my backcountry permit. The desk was staffed by a cheerful young woman who seemed surprised by my request, but willingly pulled out the log book nonetheless. I described my proposed itinerary, a 3 day/2 night loop of some 20 miles through the heart of the park. She seemed skeptical. "Are you going to bail out on this hike?" It was my turn to be taken aback. "No, why would I come here, get a permit and then not hike?" "Well, most people get a few miles into the backcountry and decide it's too steep and dry and then bail" "Those people must be flatlanders. No self-respecting Coloradan would do that." "Maybe." She looked up from her log book, an arched brow conveying her opinion of my self-respect. "Camp only in the designated sites, and carry at least a gallon of water per day. Make sure someone else knows when you are supposed to be back, we won't go find you. Enjoy your hike."

Into the Guadalupe Backcountry

I headed back to the campground, parked the car, loaded my pack down with seven liters of slightly salty water from the campground faucet and headed out on the trail. The Pine Springs Campground sits at about 5600 feet, the rim of the sky island is close to 8000 feet. I made my way steadily up the well-graded trail, stopping every few hundred yards to wheeze away the remnants of an unresolved cold. The winter sun was warm and pleasant, and the views at every switchback gave me a good excuse to stop and rest for a bit. No point in pushing the pace. I was climbing the canyon wall facing Guadalupe Peak, with the rock formations of Devil's Hall below, and a river of rocks in the canyon bottom flowing out into the Chihuahuan Desert. It was not a comfortable or familiar sort of terrain, but it felt good to be out: out on the trail, out among the rocks, out under a blue sky rimmed with limestone ridges and peaks, wondering what awaited me above, up on the shores of the island.

A couple hours hiking brought me up to the rim, and an abrupt transition. The shadeless canyon wall I had climbed gave way to a forest of junipers, pines, and oaks. A quartet of mule deer was browsing at the trail junction and slipped quietly away as I threw off my pack for a lunch break.

The still air of the canyon was replaced by a chilly wind. Not surprising, as these mountains rise thousands of feet above an otherwise featureless plain that extends for hundreds of miles in every direction. Something about the wind reminded me of the Tehachapi Mountains of California. I am pretty sure that "Tehachapi" is a Native word that means "mountains of cold winds", and the wind here, like there, was cold, austere, and punchy.

There's nothing like a bit of breeze to cut short lunch break ruminations and get a hiker moving again. The big climb done, the trail now rolled easily through the mostly forested slopes and ravines of the mountain top. The trees were mixture of Gambel oak, ponderosa pine, alligator juniper and even the occasional Douglas fir. The landscape seemed pleasant enough, but something was off, not quite right.

A few more miles of walking brought me to the backcountry campground, thoughtfully situated on the lee side of the ridge away from the prevailing winds. The sites are well-protected by trees, spacious and nicely graded. There were a half-dozen of them and they all looked unused. I picked one with the best lounging spot, pitched my tent, and then sat out behind a rock to snack on trail mix, write in my journal and read.

I was reading Muir's Mountains of California and realized what gave this place its feeling of abandonment: there were no squirrels. Squirrels annoy humans because they are on to us. They know that we are frauds and posers, and are not afraid to make their opinions known. Alone among the rodents, they don't hide or run away when we appear. Instead, they announce our presence, scold us, tell us to get the heck away from their tree. They are not least bit deferential, and they will gladly swipe our granola bars and trail mix as the opportunity arises. We are just chumps to them, suckers to be sized up and shaken down.

But squirrels are very much the animating spirits of any forest, giving it life, movement, and breath. Without squirrels, a forest is just a bunch of trees. And here they were absent. There were no middens, no chittering from above, no scurrying. The trees stood still and mute.

The next morning was clear and fair, and I day-hiked a couple of miles to the east along McKittrick Ridge, which forms the northern rim of the sky island. From this ridge I could well appreciate the interior "bowl" of the range, almost like a crater, which gathers itself and then drains eastward down McKittrick Canyon, the only area of the park with any surface water. The ridge also affords fine views of Dog Canyon and the north-trending escarpment that leads the eye on to the Sierra Blanca, nearly 100 miles distant and considered the southernmost alpine mountain range in the US. But the view was mostly of space and emptiness: plains below, mountains on the far horizon, only air between.

I collected my pack back at camp and proceeded north and then west, climbing up the high western rim to its sheer dropoffs. The trail here was little used and well advanced in the process of reverting to game track and bushwhack. True to its desert nature, the brush was of a thorny nature and I left a fair amount of hide behind as a blood offering to the prickly spirits of this mountain.

The forest and brush continued lonely and nearly devoid of animal life along this ridge. A few scrub jays creaked and squawked in the junipers. A solitary red-tail hawk rode the thermals until it was a speck against the sky, then departed southward toward the Rio Grande. But no mice scurried through the oak leaves, no rabbits loped along through the brush. There was no whiff of a skunk. The occasional snow banks I passed retained no prints, and even the scarce coyote scat was desiccated and weathered, more talismans of departed wizards than leavings of hungry canines. As I worked my way up to Bush Mountain at the apex of the ridge, I felt an aloneness, like I was the last man to inspect a fallen civilization before leaving it behind forever to the mercies of wind and time.

An Astounding View

The peak afforded more hundred-mile views out over the vanished ocean and I began to sense a different life in this mountain, this ancient reef, built from the very bodies of its former inhabitants. It stood here through the time of trilobites. It was still standing when the dinosaurs vanished. It remained here still to be lifted up above the desert floor 30 million years ago. It has seen the appearance of the gigantic Shasta ground sloth and the sloth's inevitable disappearance after the arrival of the first humans. It has seen the Mescalero Apaches take refuge here from their Comanche enemies. It has seen ranchers drive out the Apaches only to be driven out themselves by drought and isolation. This rock has an integrity and a life of its own, a life that transcends the fleeting passage of echinoids, mollusks, reptiles, dinosaurs, mammals and most certainly, of the occasional and overly introspective bipedal primate. It is its own place and cannot be compared to any other. It is to be enjoyed on its own terms or not at all.

I left the mountain top and continued along the ridge, making my piney campsite back near the main trail well before dusk. The campsites again were meticulously prepared and sheltered from the wind which began dying along with the light. I slept through a still night and woke again to a morning devoid of birdsong and made my way back down the long descent to Pine Springs. There I found a note taped to my car. Strider had run out of Gatorade in Rattlesnake Canyon, had backtracked to McKittrick Canyon and hitched back to obtain more electrolytes. He soon appeared and we got in the car to drive to points north of the Guadalupes to resume his hike. This sky island was no lush and welcoming oasis, but we had met it, respected it, learned from it. It would remain and we would leave.

Need to Know

Information

Guadalupe Mountains National park consists of over 86,000 acres, holds the highest point in Texas (Guadalupe Peak), and has 80 miles of trails with 10 designated backcountry campsites. A first come, first serve free permit must be obtained in person to start your trip at park headquarters or at the Dog Canyon Ranger Station. There is no water in the backcountry (water is available from several frontcountry park sources), and fires are never allowed.

Best Time to Go

October – early May, although temperatures can dip to the teens and below in December and January. Summers are infernally hot.

Getting There

The Guadalupe Mountains National Park Visitor Center and Pine Springs Campground are located just off US 62/180, 110 miles east of El Paso, 56 miles west or Carlsbad, NM. El Paso is the nearest regular-service commercial airport. There are NO SERVICES between El Paso and GMNP, be sure to leave El Paso with a full tank of gas in your car. The nearest services to Pine Springs are at White's City, 30 miles east at the turnoff to Carlsbad Caverns. Water, restrooms and picnic tables are available at the campground, which has both tent and RV camping areas.

Maps and Books

The NPS website has quite a bit of information. The Trails Illustrated Map 203 covers the entire park and displays all of its hiking trails. A Falcon Guide that covers GMNP as well as the nearby Carlsbad Caverns is also available. For getting to and from the trailhead and exploring other destinations in the state, the Delorme Texas Atlas & Gazetteer can be useful.

Editor's Note: This article by Drew "HappyHour" Smith originally appeared in Issue 30 of TrailGroove Magazine. You can read the original article here for additional photos and content.