The group of high mountains directly in front of you is known as the Chisos Mountains. Formed about 42 million years ago, some of the Chisos Mountain peaks share an origin similar to the Rosillos'. Emory Peak, the highest point in the park, and the third highest mountain in the state of Texas, rises 7,825 feet (2,385 meters) above sea level.

Legend suggests that the word Chisos means "ghost-like." Distance, weather, and lightning sometimes combine to cause these mountains to take on such characteristics. A more popular belief holds that Chisoz, later spelled Chisos, is a Spanish pluralization of the Apachean word chishi which means "people of the forest." A forest, you ask? How could there be a forest in the desert? Take a drive up to the Chisos Basin and discover for yourself a forested island in a sea of desert.