The Notch

You start in the Chihuahuan Desert, all prickly pear and limestone dust, and within a couple miles McKittrick Canyon swallows you into something else entirely — a riparian corridor with bigtooth maples, Texas madrones, and actual shade. The first stretch follows the canyon floor on a well-maintained path past the historic Pratt Cabin, but after the cabin the trail starts earning its 'difficult' rating. The route climbs steeply up the canyon wall through a series of switchbacks that feel relentless in the midday sun, gaining over a thousand feet of elevation before dumping you at the Notch — a dramatic cleft in the ridge where the entire canyon unfurls below you like a topographic map come to life. The nine-mile round trip will take most hikers the better part of a day. This one rewards people who like their scenery earned, not handed to them from a parking lot.