Happy Threesome and the Black Canyon - Steep, Deep and Narrow

We arrived in Montrose on Wednesday, 4/19, and had a few days to catch up on laundry, maintenance, and shopping before Rian arrived on the 21^st. Montrose exemplifies Colorado’s outdoor enthusiast vibe with a large array of city parks connected by paved walking/biking paths. Several of the linear parks had par courses with the most sophisticated and well maintained exercise equipment I’ve ever seen in a public park. The snow topped mountain ranges surrounding the town were breathtaking. This area has a lot to recommend it.

Rog was also able to get in a mountain bike ride on the nearby Buzzard Gulch trail. He liked the trail, but said the scenery wasn’t as spectacular as his last ride in red-rock country.

Pretty, but not as striking as red-rock country.

The Cedar Creek RV park we stayed at was in the city limits, so we were close to shopping and restaurants. On the downside, the spaces were way too close together for comfort and those gorgeous mountain views were obscured by the surrounding buildings. The RV park did have the most elaborate mini-golf of any campground we’ve ever visited. If you get a kick out of mini-golf, you’d have loved it – 18-holes, moving obstacles, well designed course, and lots of fun. We played the course with Rian and I’m glad there were no officials to observe some of our, ahem, more questionable tactics. Lol.

We picked Rian up at the Grand Junction airport around 9:30pm Friday evening. She came bearing gifts, taking care of Rog’s birthday, Father’s Day and Mother’s Day in one fell swoop. Mine was extra special – love it! Saturday, we started the day off right with a trip to the local farmer’s market. It was small, but had two vendors with really yummy baked goods. We loaded up on bread, pastries, coffee cake, and assorted other treats. One of these days I’ll actually just buy produce at the farmer’s market. (But not today! Lol.)

Rian made this plaque. Love it. Love her. Love the Callie girl.

Soooooo good! :) 

After a caffeine and carbohydrate breakfast, we made the 15-mile drive to Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. This was another of those parks I’d never heard of before planning this trip. While everyone’s heard of the Grand Canyon, the Black Canyon is unique in how incredibly deep, steep and narrow it is. Carved by the rushing Gunnison River, it got its name because so little sunlight reached the bottom of the narrow canyon that some areas are nearly always dark. Parts of the river are so fast and rocky, dropping 480 feet in one two-mile stretch, that it is considered unnavigable.  The parts you can float are still recommended for expert/experienced kayakers – guess our little inflatable kayak won’t be getting wet here! Lol.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison

Father-Daughter Selfie. 

The visitor’s center has a cool sculpture showing the profile of the canyon. At the Narrows, the small visitor’s center building would completely span the bottom of the 2300-foot deep canyon!

Yep, it gets narrow at the bottom.
Not that far across at the rim either, in many places it's deeper than it is wide.

Happy Threesome.

Getting to the bottom of the canyon is a back-country wilderness hike so we stuck with the 7-mile scenic drive which has 12 overlooks with shorter hikes along the rim. On Saturday, we did just a part of the south-rim drive and the 2-mile Oak Flat Loop trail. At this elevation, there was still snow and ice on the shady parts of the trail. A bit nippy too. 😊

Oak Flat Loop Trail.

Snow and sheer walls along the trail.

Enjoying the view.

Cross Fissures Overlook.

Bonding over a really big hole in the ground. :) 

Sunday morning we indulged in French Toast made from the delicious homemade farmer’s market bread before returning to the Black Canyon. We finished up the south-rim drive and did the hike out to Warner Point where the gorge is 2,772 feet deep and you also have great views of the snowy West Elk mountain range.

The Painted Wall.
This is one of the highlights and rightly so, fabulous striations in the rock face. 

Contemplating geology.

The gorge is deepest at Warner Point, 2,772 feet doooooown.

The snowy West Elk Mountains make a nice backdrop for the canyon.

Rian is not at all fond of heights (she comes by that honestly), but she enjoyed the views and had a great time rock hunting along the trails (and that too! Lol.). We both loved the twisted Juniper trees and she took time for a few tree-yoga poses. Lol. We were hoping to sight a Big Horn Sheep, but had to content ourselves with birds, squirrels, and a curious mule deer.  

Tree yoga. :)

The twisted Juniper trees were awesome.

What's not to love about these views!

A collection of critters.
Notice the woodpecker moved so fast he left a ghost image.

I had intended to cram our week of familial adventures into one post, but ended up with way too many pics. So stay tuned for an unplanned trip to the Colorado National Monument and our nine-month anniversary update.