We found Texas’ best kept secret this Spring Break and it’s called Palo Duro Canyon. I have been all around this great state, but have never ventured north to the Texas Panhandle until we decided to take the kids and drive to Amarillo, TX to check out the home of the second largest canyon in the US.
Just for comparison, The Grand Canyon is 277 miles long, 18 miles wide, and 1 mile deep with over 5 million visitors a year. But during our Spring Break in March 2023, the Grand Canyon still had snow and many trails were closed for hikers so we were unable to hike down in it. We still had an incredible time and you can check out my post here for details.
What is Palo Duro Canyon? This canyon is 120 miles long, 20 miles wide, and 800 feet deep. It has around 400,000 visitors a year – which makes for a great “uncrowded” Spring Break destination! It has a rich history of early humans, mammoth, bison, Spanish explorers, and was once inhabited by many Native American cultures. The canyon sits on the Llano Estacado mesa and was formed by the Prairie Dog Town fork Red River. Most of the canyon’s rock layers are from the Triassic and Permian periods. The canyon has formations that include caves and hoodoos which are formed when erosion rates differ in the rock layers.
The drive from our house to Amarillo is about 8 hours, so we decided to break up our trip and head first to Lubbock and stop for the night. Let’s just say there is a whole lot of road, dust, and windmills between here and Lubbock.
I knew how long we would be in the car so I printed this Road Trip Pack from Etsy and packed a ton of Sour Patch Kids and snacks. We played George Strait hoping that we would get to Amarillo by morning.😉
After our overnight stop in Lubbock, we drove through the Texas Tech University campus and then checked out Prairie Dog Town home of the black-tailed prairie dog. It was established in 1930 to protect those cute little critters – also known as sodpoodles – from extinction. We saw hundreds of prairie dogs and even this grey fox lurking around the park!
On our way out of Lubbock, we listened to a little Buddy Holly and hit the road for another 2 hours to Amarillo. We kept marveling that we had driven over 7 hours and still hadn’t left the great state of Texas! We were on a mission to get to Amarillo by lunch. In “Lightning McQueen” style, we found Old Route 66 and enjoyed lunch at The GoldenLight Cafe – the oldest restaurant still operating on the mother road. Later that afternoon, we headed to Cadillac Ranch to make our mark on the famous 1974 art installation of 10 Cadillacs buried in the ground. This art is an homage to the evolution of the Cadillac tailfin from 1949 to 1963.
I had no idea how much our kids would enjoy spray painting these old cars and we were all amazed at the layer upon layer of paint indicating how much past visitors had enjoyed it too!
Cadillac Ranch was definitely one of the top 3 things we did while in Amarillo – despite being in a very windy cornfield – it was well worth the visit and made for some great pictures after the long drive. The kids enjoyed the pool at the Amarillo Embassy Suites before we headed to The Big Texan for steaks (which was another top 3) and to get some rest before we checked out Palo Duro Canyon the next day. We were told that when driving to Palo Duro Canyon we would all of a sudden see the flat land just open up into a canyon – and that was absolutely true. It almost came out of nowhere and we marveled at how similar the canyon was to the Grand Canyon. After parking at the visitor center, we just stood there in awe at the lookout point over Palo Duro.
The most famous landmark (and hoodoo formation) in the canyon is Light House Rock which is at the end of a 3 mile trail (so plan for a 3 mile hike there and a 3 mile hike back). So around 10:45 we left the visitor center and drove down into the canyon being still completely amazed at the colors and beauty of the canyon.
On the trail, we took our time marveling at the satin spar gypsum we could crumble with our hands on the trail and running up and down the different rock faces. 
Was it a hard hike? I won’t lie, we were not prepared for how hot it was going to be or how long it was going to take to hike the trail in the heat. Luckily we had plenty of water and sunscreen but it. was. hot. 🥵🔥
My husband was in jeans, I was wearing my “skinny mom jeans” and my kiddos were wearing pants because I honestly thought it would be cold! Just a few days before Amarillo had snow but there was no snow to be found on the floor of the canyon which was about 6 degrees hotter than at the top.
So that first day, after we spotted Light House Rock around 1.5 miles, and decided to come back earlier the next day with better clothes, hats, sunglasses for all, and even more water to hike to the end of the Light House trail.
On the second day, we got started on the trail around 9:45am with my youngest leading the way. She claims that was her favorite part!
It was so much more pleasant earlier in the morning with less crowds, less people on bikes, and less heat!
What are your best hiking tips? #1: Go in the morning. #2 The trail itself is relatively flat until you get to the end at the fork in the road. At this fork, there is a picnic table, go on the trail to the left of the picnic table. It is a little rockier, looks a bit more physically challenging, but this path will steer you clear of any cliff or drops (especially with little kids). My heart was pounding pretty hard just from that climb up – but it was worth it to get to the top!
So what is at the top of Light House Rock? An incredible view of the hoodoo formation, wind, and a lot of happy faces for tackling a challenging climb. The wind gusts were high that day, but it really was a gorgeous view and we had a huge sense of accomplishment. As with any climb, trust your gut, and gauge your safety and how high you should go. I decided to let the older kids go a bit higher with my husband while me and my little stayed out of the wind gusts!
But my teenager loved her view at the top and said she was hanging on tight to her camera for this picture above! Be sure to stop at the wooden bench for a family pic before hiking back. Also, to keep ourselves motivated on the way back, we talked about the ice cream and hamburgers (which were fabulous) that we were going to have at the Trading Post!
During this Spring Break, we had a lot of road time which equals a lot of family time – but honestly that was the best part. It was a memorable Spring Break that we highly recommend. So, I guess you can say now that I’ve let you in on our little secret – Palo Duro – the grandest canyon in Texas! 😉
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