Enjoy the rugged beauty and shimmering sunsets of the Texas Plains. Miles and miles of short grass prarie gives way suddenly and unexpectedly to spectacular canyon vistas as you cross this 52-county region that covers approximately 50,000 square miles! The normally pleasant weather can change in an instant and quickly change back again. One of the last parts of the continental United States to be permanently settled, the Texas Plains have been occupied for millennia. More than 12,000 years ago, the Clovis people, the earliest known residents of North America, roamed this land hunting the ancient bison and the Columbian mammoth. In time, the Apache and Comanche nations came, followed by Spanish explorers, cowboys on the free range, and finally, homesteaders seeking opportunity in a new place. The stories of the land and the people are the history of the Texas Plains—and the true stories of the West.