Parking
The trailhead is at the end of a paved road off Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive. The park lists 16 pull-in spaces and one accessible parking space.
Overview
About Lower Burro Mesa Pouroff Trail
Why go
- A distinctive 100-foot pouroff at the end of a half-hour walk.
- The wash, volcanic bands, and boulders add real geology to a short route.
Heads up
- Uneven steps and loose gravel make the wash awkward for anyone unsteady.
- The route is brief and centers on one main feature.
Map & elevation
The route
Loading the Big Bend map
Full mapElevation3,300–3,358 ft
Plan your hike
Before you go
Parking
Safety
2 active Big Bend alerts
- ClosureWeather-related road closuresDo not use these closed roads; NPS lists the closures as in effect until further notice.Official details
- InfoBoquillas Crossing schedule changeBoquillas Crossing is open Friday through Monday, 9:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m.; NPS says it will not change to winter hours at this time. Check current park conditions before planning a crossing.Official details
The highest, rockiest slopes around here are a summer buffet for grizzly bears.
Big Bend Tour Guide
Your drive to Lower Burro Mesa Pouroff Trail, narrated.
Parkwolf is a GPS audio tour guide for Big Bend National Park. As you drive, it chimes in with what’s ahead: hidden gems, upcoming stops, history, geology, and wildlife, right through your car’s speakers.
See the Big Bend audio tourRecorded for this trailhead
Lower Burro Mesa Pouroff0:00 / 0:22
“You're coming up on the Lower Burro Mesa Pouroff trailhead, where a short hike leads beneath a hundred-foot rock chute. Come for the canyon walls and the shape water has carved; the pour-off is dry most of the year.”
Plays as you drive up to this trailhead in the Parkwolf Big Bend Tour Guide.
More stories near here in the app
- Burro Spring Trail
- Why Adobe Needs More Mud
- The Mistletoe Bird
- Life Between the Desert Plants
- 110 audio storiesacross Big Bend’s roads, triggered by GPS as you drive
- Wildlife heatmapsfor Black Bear, Collared Peccary, White-tailed Deer, and 13 more
- Works offlinemaps, 45 trails, 64 places, and audio download before you lose signal
- CarPlay readysimple controls built for the drive
“Fantastic app with many points of information… It’s great to just turn on while you’re driving and it gives you an audio tour of the national Park. We love it!!!!”
Trail guide
Hiking Lower Burro Mesa Pouroff Trail
A short walk with a clear payoffLower Burro Mesa Pouroff Trail is a one-mile out-and-back to a narrow rock channel in the…
Lower Burro Mesa Pouroff Trail is a one-mile out-and-back to a narrow rock channel in the desert. Allow about 30 minutes for the round trip. It is an easy, relatively flat choice when you want a brief geology walk along Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive; the outing is built around the pouroff at the end, rather than a long scenic traverse.
From dirt path into the washThe walk starts on fairly level dirt and rock.
The walk starts on fairly level dirt and rock. After roughly a quarter mile, uneven steps drop into the wash, where the footing changes to coarse sand and gravel. At the wash, take the right-hand drainage and follow it to the pouroff, then return the same way. A few visitors have missed the destination around a split, so stay with the main drainage instead of following another branch.
Volcanic hills and desert plantsThe wash runs between hills banded with yellow and orange ash-flow tuff, with large…
The wash runs between hills banded with yellow and orange ash-flow tuff, with large conglomerate boulders scattered along the valley floor. Mexican persimmon, Mexican buckeye, and desert hackberry grow along the drainage. The change from a dirt path to a boulder-strewn wash is most of the walk’s variety.
At the pouroffThe trail ends below a roughly 100-foot vertical channel carved into the rock, where water from…
The trail ends below a roughly 100-foot vertical channel carved into the rock, where water from the mesa above funnels into the wash. It is dry most of the year. From the gravel floor, frame the whole chute between its walls to show its height. Flash floods can race down this wash during rainy-season storms, so stay out of the drainage when storms threaten. Pets are not allowed on park trails.
The trailhead is at the end of a paved road off Ross Maxwell Scenic Drive. The park lists 16 pull-in spaces and one accessible space.
Wildlife
Wildlife in Big Bend
377 sightingsBlack BearMost seen around 7 PMSighting map
329 sightingsCollared PeccaryMost seen around 7 PMSighting map
500 sightingsWhite-tailed DeerMost seen around 7 PMSighting map
985 sightingsRoadrunnerMost seen around 8 AMSighting map
228 sightingsRavenMost seen around 5 PMSighting map
264 sightingsTurkey VultureMost seen around noonSighting mapSighting maps show where each species has been reported across Big Bend. Wildlife moves, so no sighting is guaranteed.
