I went back to McKinney Roughs to walk Yaupon which is one of the hardest trails to hike at the park. It’s harder than Pine Ridge with all of its steps mainly due to the terrain which is like a switchback, up and down turn a corner and another uphill. In some places, the trail is made up of loose pebble stones which by themselves are difficult to walk on. Add them to a hill and its twice as hard whether going up or down.

In theory, Yaupon does complete a full circle IF the trail at Roadrunner and Coyote Road were open. Unfortunately, since the last major flood, the trails are washed out by the river and the circuit is broken and not passable. Knowing this, my plan was to walk Yaupon starting at the Main Office Parking Lot, walk to the Pope Bend Trailhead and then turn back and retrace my steps completing my own little circuit.

The weather was cool enough that the hike was enjoyable at least from the comfort point of view. That still didn’t change the difficulty of the trail but at least was one less thing to consider. Another young couple started the trail ahead of me and judging by the binoculars they were both wearing, were bird enthusiasts. They took the the Coyote Road trail where it branched off at Bobcat Ridge while I continued along my planned route of Yaupon. After that, I had the trail to myself in both directions for the duration of the walk.

The picture at  the top of the page is a panorama of three pictures. The rest of the pictures below are of the Yaupon trail.

All in all, it was another very enjoyable walk even though I did feel a little tired at the end of it. Altogether, I covered 8.5 miles and finished it off with a walk around HEB for some grocery shopping which brought the days total to 9.0 miles. Not bad for an old fart…