Missouri's Best Day Hike: Mina Sauk Falls to Devils Toll Gate at Taum Sauk

#hiking #missouri #minasaukfalls

Today I’m hiking what I think might be Missouri’s best day hike, Mina Sauk Falls to Devils Toll Gate, a hiking trail at Taum Sauk Mountain State Park. In one five mile hike you’ll experience: Missouri’s tallest peak, Taum Sauk Mountain (1,772ft), Missouri’s tallest waterfall, Mina Sauk Falls (132ft), a beautiful unobstructed panoramic view of the St. Francois mountains, classic Missouri glades, a section of the Ozark Trail, and a unique 30ft rhyolite rock formation over a billion years old, the Devil’s Toll Gate. If there was one hike to showcase all the beauty the Missouri outdoors has to offer, Mina Sauk Falls to Devil’s Toll Gate is probably it.

Devin Barnett:   / _devinbarnett  
Adam McQuerry:   / adam.mcquerry.986  

Mina Sauk Falls to Devil's Toll Gate Blog Post - https://www.michaelshepherdjordan.com...

My AllTrails Map: https://www.alltrails.com/explore/rec...

Note: My distance is longer than the 5 mile hike as I’m walking back and forth to the camera.

Missouri’s high point, Taum Sauk Mountain (1,772ft), to be honest is a little underwhelming being the tallest mountain in Missouri. There is no beautiful bluff view or really any view at all, simply a stone and small plaque marking Missouri's tallest peak. The good news is this is ADA accessible and just a short walk from the parking lot.

After writing my name in the notebook commemorating my accomplishment (lol), I continued along the trail to Mina Sauk Falls. For the next 1.2 miles I passed through several classic Missouri glades - dry, open, rocky, thin-soiled areas featuring outcroppings of rhyolite or granite bedrock generally facing south west - which are reminiscent of trails one might expect to find in the Rocky Mountains. At the 1 mile mark the trail features a beautiful unobstructed year-round panoramic view of the St. Francois Mountains to the west.

After 1.3 miles I reached the top of Mina Sauk Falls. Here the trail splits and I took the fork to the right onto the Ozark Trail to descend to the base of the falls. Unfortunately the water wasn’t flowing as Mina Sauk is a wet weather water fall best visited in Spring or after a rain.

I continued on the Taum Sauk to Johnson Shut-Ins section of the Ozark Trail to the Devil’s Toll Gate. Along the way I met Devin Barnett and Adam McQuerry who work for The Ozark Trail Association. They were out clearing downed trees on this section of the OT. Devin was nice enough to share his knowledge of the Devil’s Toll Gate with me.

The Devil’s Toll Gate is a 30ft tall outcropping of rhyolite porphyry with a roughly 8ft wide gap that the trail passes through. Just wide enough for a wagon, this trail was used as a wagon road in the 1800s. Rhyolite porphyry is an extrusive igneous rock roughly 1.5 billion years old, some of the oldest extrusive igneous rock in North America. It was formed when the St. Francois Mountains were molded from caldera volcanoes 1.5 billion years ago.

After experiencing the Devil’s Toll Gate I doubled back on the OT to return to Mina Sauk Falls, forked right at the split atop the falls, and followed the trail back to the parking lot, completing arguably Missouri’s best day hike.

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00:00 Introduction
00:25 Highest Point in Missouri
02:32 Mina Sauk Falls Trail Overlook
04:08 Missouri's Tallest Waterfall
05:49 Devils Toll Gate
08:37 Top of Mina Sauk Falls
10:05 Mina Sauk Falls Trail Reiw