Montrose, CO / Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park

Wow! It’s hard to describe how beautiful this park is! We stayed in the South Rim Campground for one night in order to spend some time in The Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. As we were setting up, the friendly campground host pulled up in his golf cart and gave us tips on what to do while we were there. We took his advise and hiked the Rim Rock Nature Trail along the canyon rim to visitor center, then hiked the Uplands Trail back to the campground. It was about two miles round trip.

Later, we drove down the steep, curvy East Portal Road to the bottom of the canyon and along the Gunnison River. That was an adventure in itself, but we made it all the way down safely! Since that part of the river is known as Gold Medal Waters, Randy gave fishing another shot. Unfortunately, the fish seem to be smart enough not to bite a fake spinner fish with hooks on it, so he still didn’t catch one. (That’s probably why the fish have lived long enough to get so large!) We headed back to the top of the canyon when it started raining.

The next morning, we drove along South Rim Road, stopping at most of the overlooks to get different views of the canyon. They were all spectacular! Randy said he thought this canyon was perhaps even cooler than the Grand Canyon. We probably could have spent another day exploring here, but we had to be checked out by 1pm. So we headed back to the RV to hitch up and move on to our next campground reservation.