Elephant Rocks State Park
Hiking in Elephant Rocks State Park, MO | Camping in Mark Twain National Forest | November 2024
Before embarking on this trip, we did some research and had several areas picked out where we could visit, hike, get new counties, and different places where we could camp. But between the cold and feeling worn out from all our other travels this fall, we ended up taking it much easier while here. On our first full day, we didn’t drive anywhere — in fact, I only stepped outside of the van when we were walking on the Ozark Trail, it was simply too cold for me to function outside if I wasn’t moving. Curtis and Charlotte are better at handling the cold, and had different ways of occupying themselves outside: Charlotte with her sniffing, and Curtis discovered there was a hickory tree overhead and a black walnut tree down the road and spent a lot of time harvesting nuts.
The next day, it was still cold, but we decided to venture out and visit one of those places we had starred on our map. It was about a 40 minute drive South to reach the park, though we went a little out of our way to grab another new county. Our park of choice was Elephant Rocks State Park, located right off MO-21. The park has a mile long loop trail that takes you through these neat rock formations, up to an overlook of the park and surrounding forest. We had originally found this place when on a road trip in spring of 2022, but after visiting Taum Sak we decided it was too cold and instead drove straight home to Omaha. Now here we were, it was still cold, but we are much more comfortable with our van so this trip made things that much easier!
When we started on the main loop trail, we learned that it is actually called the Braille Trail, as it was specifically designed for the blind. Along the way, there were different patches of textured ground followed by an interpretive sign that was both written out and in Braille. There was also an occasional rope fence along the side of the trail. It was a pretty neat concept, however as ‘seeing eye people’ for a blind dog, we were pretty quick to notice the faults in the system. It didn’t make sense why there wasn’t always a fence along the path, and there were certain parts where large boulders would jut into the trail with no warning, which blind people could trip over, or blind puppies could run into. And overall, we think the trail has seen better days. But Charlotte has us to guide her, so she doesn’t have to worry about that. She did find certain parts of the trail a little scary — namely the ‘slot canyon’, or trail that narrowly went between two large boulders, but aside from that she completed the loop with our help and encouragement.
As a self-proclaimed ‘rock hopper’, I have to say this place was awesome, I enjoyed scaling the rocks safely whenever I had the chance. Fall had mostly left this area, but there were still a few trees holding on to their burnt orange leaves. We enjoyed the different viewpoints, and made it all the way around the loop. After that, we had a little picnic lunch in the park before making our way back to Berryman Campground. On our way, we drove through Caledonia, which had a big Christmas market type thing happening and looked rather charming, but we’re not good at that type of thing, so we simply admired it as we drove by.
We spent our last full day in the area stationary at the campground once again, except that day was a beautiful, warm, sunny day, so we were able to spend the whole day outside! We walked, snacked, harvested nuts, sniffed, and worked on our own little hobbies. Overall it was a very relaxing time, and we’re thankful for the time we spent here before returning back to our family, commitments, and work!
