Another 21 cities have populations exceeding 50,000. The state's surface ranges from sea level to rocky ramparts looming above a mile high in the mountainous Trans-Pecos region. The southern terminus of the table-flat Great Plains of the United States fills much of the Texas Panhandle. Nearly as flat are vast coastal plains along the entire arc of the Gulf of Mexico. Grassy, rolling prairies, where ranches and Texas cowboys still thrive, cover thousands of square miles.
Deep forests blanket millions of East Texas acres.
In the Texas Hill Country, steep limestone hills enfold secluded valleys. There are sun-baked desertlands, rich, black farmlands, humid swamps where wild orchids grow, and dramatic volcanic intrusions of dark basalt and glistening granite. Texas has 91 mountains a mile or more high, all of them in the Trans-Pecos region. Guadalupe Peak, at 8,749 feet the state's highest mountain, is more than 2,000 feet higher than North Carolina's Mount Mitchell, greatest elevation east of the Mississippi River. They extend over all or parts of 43 counties and include four national forests covering 635 thousand acres.