Hiking the Marufo Vega Trail in Big Bend National Park

If you read my full post on staying at Big Bend National Park, you know I was just a liiiiiittle nervous going into the trip. Big Bend was our first National Park together as well as the first place we’d really be trying our hand at dry camping (camping without hookups). Plus, there was going to be zero cell service.

Despite my apprehension, the first night we spent at the park went fantastic and it seemed like this whole thing was going to work out just fine.

Both of us really enjoy hiking, and it’s something we often seek out at any new destination. However, besides hiking the Blue Mountain Peak in Jamaica, we hadn’t done much over 7 miles or so.

We spent the first afternoon doing a quick 1.5 mile round-trip hike to Boquillas Canyon, but we decided that the next day we should do something big. LET’S GO BIG AT BIG BEND.

Marufo Vega Trail

The Marufo Vega trail is categorized as a 14-mile strenuous round-trip hike with a 2,660 ft. elevation gain. The brochure you get at the Visitors Center is full of helpful tips for hiking it, although it makes it a little intimidating — warnings of no water, extreme heat, theft at the trailhead, and a statement that safety is your responsibility as they do not monitor backcountry trails all make for a few nervous laughs.

But after some good convincing arguments from Alex, I agreed to go for it. What’s the worst that could happen? *heh heh*

It Starts

We figured the smartest thing we could do was to start the trail early. Although this was February, we knew that the desert sun could be brutal no matter what time of year and that we should try to get some good ground covered before the heat hit its most intense.

But we also didn’t want to start the trail in darkness. With no man-made light pollution, Big Bend is pitch black until the sun rises. We offically hit the trail at 8:15am with nice, cool temperatures, plenty of shade, and enough sunlight to see easily.

Thankfully, before entering the park, I downloaded all the Big Bend trail maps to my All Trails app on my cell phone. I have the Pro membership thanks to a Christmas gift from my Mom, and it has already proved to be incredibly helpful. Since we’d be venturing out without a guide, it was reassuring to know that the downloaded map would always be available to lead the way in case things got confusing out there.

Ok — So we’ve got a map on my phone, good weather so far, and two gallons of water. Feeling good. Let’s do this!

The trail starts out easy enough. The ground is rocky, but overall flat and you pass some remains of an old cable line back when there was a silver mine in the area.

After a mile and a half however, the real fun starts.

Looking ahead at where the marker arrows point, and you’ll see that you are in for a climb.

Now is when you really start to feel like you are one of the early explorers of the Southwest. During the beginning of the hike, both of us kept commenting on how much we felt like we were back in the 1800s, before the development of real towns and cities existed.

But now that you start scrambling up canyon walls, there’s an incredible feeling of true solitude. One of the amazing things about Big Bend National Park is it’s location. It’s a bit tricky to get to which means that you’re never really surrounded by a ton of people. And on the backcountry trails, this is taken to another level. There is just…nobody. Seemingly all of this splendor to yourself.

Now, at this point is was also sinking in that we better keep it together and not accidentally break an ankle or something. No people means beautiful isolation, but it also means no help.

The scenery along the hike is nothing short of breathtaking. Our pace would have definitely been a lot quicker if we wouldn’t have been constantly stopping to take photos.

South Loop vs. North Loop

At about 3.5 miles in, there is a division in the route. A sign will tell you that you can either veer right and take the South Loop, or go left and take the North Loop. But! It does not tell you how long each side is. The route map from the Visitor Center does, but I neglected to look at this…

Without much thought, we went to the right to take the South Loop.

The path really got adventurous here, with lots of steep inclines and descents. Although I had my downloaded map on my phone, we found that even though the trail itself wasn’t always easy to see, the cairns leading the path were frequent and easy to spot. Any time we were in question of what way to go, we just looked a little ahead and would find a cairn almost immediately.

As it turns out, the South Loop is 2.5 miles long. After this, the trail connects with the North Loop and you have the option of either then continuing along the loop and making your way back, or taking a 1/2 mile hike down a steep canyon to reach the Rio Grande.

Now about 6.5 miles into the hike, we were ready to rest our legs and have lunch and thought sandwiches by the river sounded great, so down the canyon we went.

Where the U.S. Meets Mexico

One of the most interesting things about hiking to the Rio Grande at Big Bend, is that you are as far on the United States border as you can possibly be. When we sat down next to the river with our lunch, we were looking across the river at Mexico. All one has to do is walk across the Rio and you are in an entirely different country.

This explains the amount of U.S. Border Patrol cars we saw throughout the park.

So far in the hike we had been almost entirely alone. We passed two guys at around mile 1, and 3 women who were backcountry camping on the trail for two nights around mile 4.

But here, sitting on the bank of the Rio Grande, on the border of Mexico, we were completely by ourselves except for some wild (?) horses.

We were getting ready to get moving again when a solo hiker around our age came down the path. He turned out to be really friendly, and we all chatted for another 15 mintues or so about the unbeliveable scenery we had all just witnessed. An avid hiker, he was traveling around the West in his car, working remotely at Airbnbs as he went.

Michael, was his name, and he had taken the North Loop to get here versus the South that we took.

We didn’t know it then, but we were about to discover that Michael had clearly made the wiser route choice.

Heading Back

The 45 minute break had proven to be incredibly helpful. I was re-hydrated, my legs and back felt rested, and I had calories in my system.

Michael had mentioned that his path on the North Loop was mostly downhill, which meant we were in for a good incline as we made our way heading back.

What we didn’t realize, was that not only was the path pretty much all uphill, it was also nearly a mile and a half longer than the South Loop.

But before we get into the struggles of the route, let’s talk about two incredibly fantastic things.

First, the view. The North Loop has an absolutely stunning backdrop of the Rio Grande carving its way through the canyon. There was a lot of stopping, pointing, and statements of “What!”, “Holy s***”, “How?!” “This is INSANE!”

In other words, it was frickin’ gorgeous.

Now, I absolutely love the above photo, but I’m telling you, it holds no comparison to the actual view. We witnessed an entire rainbow of colors as we hiked along the river.

A bright blue sky on top of purple mountains in the distance. Red and orange hues shone off canyons in the foreground, and lush greenery lined the bank of the sparkling, teal Rio Grande.

One of the reasons it would’ve been smarter to take the North Loop in, instead of the South, is the fact that we would’ve been facing the view of the Rio. Returning on this route meant that the best scenery was to our backs. It wasn’t a huge deal, but we definitely stopped a lot to turn around and take it all in.

I would consider this part of the trail the highlight of the hike (except for maybe the next factor I’m going to share in a minute).

The trail continues following the river for about 2 miles and every part of it is spectacular.

But what is the second fantastic thing that happend on this part of the loop?

DONKEYS!

You are repeatedly warned about animals like mountain lions, rattlesnakes, coyotes, and javelinas when camping at Big Bend, but not once was it mentioned that we may run into donkeys on the trail.

I don’t know if they are wild or belong to someone, but they didn’t appear to have any markings on them and there wasn’t anyone in the area that seemed to own them.

What was extra special was that they came walking right up to us. I imagine they were looking for food, which we wouldn’t have fed them anyway if we had any (feeding animals in the wild messes up their diets and leads them to rely on humans).

Regardless of if we had food for them or not, two out of the three had no problem with us petting them.

Where Things Got Tough

Alright, so we’ve spent the last few miles being in awe of the setting and hanging out with donkeys, but right around mile 9 things got really hard for me.

My feet hurt, my ankles hurt, my legs hurt, and my back hurt. The trail was relentlessly uphill and by this point my cell phone battery had run out so we didn’t really have an idea of how much longer we had.

Thankfully, there was only one trail to follow and it was well marked with cairns so we never felt too fearful of getting lost.

It was a hell of a good feeling when we finally made it around the loop to re-unite with the part of the trail we had already hiked coming in. To be honest though, I still wasn’t feeling great, and for a solid 4–5 miles of the hike on the way back, I had a hard time appreciating the surroundings.

When we hit the final sign telling us we only had 1.5 miles until we were back at the trail head, however, my spirits lifted.

Soon after this, we turned a corner and could see our dear Codi waiting for us in the parking lot, and I felt even better.

We both finished the Marufo Vega trail with big smiles on our face and an enormous feeling of accomplishment.

Not only had we put our physical and mental capabilities to a serious test, but we got to take in part of the park that most people will never get to see.

Neither of us will ever forget this incredible hike, and we leave it feeling inspired for more.

Originally published at https://jetlaggedjill.com on February 4, 2021.

For tips on hiking the Marufo Vega, as well as more photos from our trip, check out: https://jetlaggedjill.com/hiking-the-marufo-vega-trail-in-big-bend-national-park/