Big Bend Ranch State Park is a 311,000-acre desert landscape along the Rio Grande in far West Texas, adjoining Big Bend National Park and ranking as the state’s largest state park. Human presence there reaches back thousands of years, and later the land became a large working ranch whose open-range cattle operations still continue within the park. Texas bought the property in 1988 and opened it in stages from 1991 to 2007. Known for remote scenery, difficult terrain, and exceptionally dark skies, the park protects desert plant communities, threatened Hinckley oak, diverse wildlife, river canyons, and landmarks such as Madrid Falls while emphasizing primitive backcountry recreation.