MONDAY - Before we reach our campsite for tonight we are going to see an increase in elevation of nearly 4400'.
We got an early start, around 8:00AM, because we also have nearly 180-miles to travel. We are going to wait until we get back into Colorado to fill up ROVER's gas tank where the fuel is about $.20 a gallon cheaper.
The view from the Big Bend Campground along the Colorado River, this would have been our 2nd choice campground if we had struck out at Goose Island Campground.
This 44-mile stretch of road is called the Highway 128 Colorado River Scenic Byway.
There is plenty to distract you while you drive through Grandstaff Canyon.
This would have been our 3rd choice campground if all else failed. Besides, I just like the name. It reminds me of a dear friend we left behind when we hit the road.
Today there's not much left of the Historic 1916 Dewey Bridge, in 2008 a human-caused wildfire claimed the entire wooden roadbed.
We filled with fuel at the Pilot Travel Center in Grand Junction, CO before we started heading for Walmart, the same Walmart we wanted to stay at last night.
Just before we were supposed to turn right into the Walmart parking lot Tricia saw a Bass Pro Shop on the left side of the street and asked if we could go back so she could look for a new pair of shorts. Of course I made the u-turn and went a mile back up the road.
While she went into Bass Pro Shop I searched for a decent place to have lunch, it was almost 11:00AM. A few minutes later she came out of the store empty handed and I asked if she would like to eat at Famous Dave's Bar-B-Que. It was located right there in the parking lot of Bass Pro Shop and had received 4.0 stars on Google, the minimum rating that we will accept for a restaurant visit.
They just opened for lunch 5-minutes ago at 11:00AM, so there were only a few cars in the parking lot, probably mostly employees. That would leave plenty of room for us to park ROVER and THE POD.
When we pulled into the parking lot there was a car parked in the back corner of the lot. A young guy was flagging us down as we drove by so I rolled down the window to see what he wanted. It was obvious that he had spent the night in the parking lot. There were all kinds of Home Depot plastic storage boxes on the ground around his car and he explained that he just needed a jump start. He had unloaded his entire car searching for his jumper cables, which he eventually found.
I told him we would be glad to help, but we wouldn't be needing any cables, he gave me a weird look and shrugged his shoulders. I parked nearby and dug out our own portable battery jump starter. It only weighs about 3-pounds, but can jump start a dump truck if needed.
The young man looked skeptical when I hooked up the little device and told him to get in his car and start it. With no hesitation the car started and I disconnected the device.
He came out of his car and introduced himself as A.J. with a handshake and a big Thank You! He explained the he was headed for Grand Tetons National Park in Wyoming. He has been living in his car for 1-1/2 years as a van-lifer. I hesitated to point out that his car wasn't a van and just let it go.
The point of the story is, that if we hadn't made that u-turn to go to Bass Pro Shop, we would never have been in the Famous Dave's Bar-B-Que parking lot to meet and help this young man. He was gone by the time we left the restaurant after enjoying our lunch.
I guess our Good Karma account is once again getting a new deposit of credits!
After lunch and shopping at Walmart we still had about 80-miles to go before reaching our destination.
Before leaving Walmart I checked our evelation and found it to be 4500'+/- and I knew the elevation of our next campground was nearly 8400'+/- because it was going to be a new record for us. With nearly 3900' of elevation to gain over an 80-mile distance it didn't seem to be anything ROVER couldn't handle.
I began to worry when we reached the town of Montrose, only 15-miles from our campsite, and found that we were still at only 5700'+/-. It got serious when we turned off the highway with only 6-miles to go and still had 1800' to gain to reach our campsite.
ROVER did just fine for the first 3 of those 6-miles we had to travel, but then things started to get "hot under the hood". After two brief pulloffs to let ROVER cool down we made it to the top of the hill and arrived at our new campsite.
It's "Official", at 8384' of elevation this is the highest campsite we've ever occupied!
BUT, I'll let you in on a little secret, that record will again be broken before the summer is over.
I'll point out that you don't visit the National Parks because they have awesome campgrounds.
This campsite is considered to be "premium" for a NPS campsite, it has electricity!
With zero cell signal we depend on Starlink to bring us our internet access and wifi calling.
TUESDAY - Wasting no time, we were out the door by 8:00AM and began our exploration of Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.
It's only a little over 7-miles from the entrance gate to the end of the South Rim Road at the back of the park. Along this path you'll find no less than a dozen parking lot pullots where you can take a walk to the rim of the canyon.
Some of the walks are only a few hundred feet, but one is 1.5-miles. Most are about 200-yards or less and we didn't do anything longer than that today. I must also mention that we only explored the South Rim of the park, all of the longer hiking trails are on the North Rim.
BLACK CANYON OF THE GUNNISON NATIONAL PARK - SOUTH RIM SCENIC DRIVE
SLIDE NUMBER
1
OF
35
Our first stop is at the Tomichi Point Overlook. You can't really see much from the overlook in the parking lot.
SLIDE NUMBER
2
OF
35
But if you take the time to hike down below the parking lot...
SLIDE NUMBER
3
OF
35
...the views get much better without all the shrubbery in the way.
SLIDE NUMBER
4
OF
35
Now that's more like it!
SLIDE NUMBER
5
OF
35
If you zoom way in you can even see the Gunnison River way down below.
SLIDE NUMBER
6
OF
35
This young buck came strolling out of the shrubs to check us out.
SLIDE NUMBER
7
OF
35
Our second stop was at the Visitor Center to get my Passport Book stamped. Behind the Visitor Center is the Gunnison Point Overlook Trail.
SLIDE NUMBER
8
OF
35
There are two overlooks on this trail, one to the right and one to the left.
SLIDE NUMBER
9
OF
35
Most people today seemed to take the right hand trail to this overlook view.
SLIDE NUMBER
10
OF
35
Sure, you could see the rapids far down below...
SLIDE NUMBER
11
OF
35
...but this crumbling stone wall was blocking what I thought was the best view.
SLIDE NUMBER
12
OF
35
From the left side trail overlook you could see a longer stretch of the river...
SLIDE NUMBER
13
OF
35
...that had many more rapids to look at.
SLIDE NUMBER
14
OF
35
SLIDE NUMBER
15
OF
35
Once the river passes by the Visitor Center it enters a very narrow part of the canyon.
SLIDE NUMBER
16
OF
35
I think looking down the entrance to the left hand overlook may have scared off a few.
SLIDE NUMBER
17
OF
35
SLIDE NUMBER
18
OF
35
This comes up as Sulfer Buckwheat in our plant identification app.
SLIDE NUMBER
19
OF
35
This view is from the Pulpit Rock Overlook.
SLIDE NUMBER
20
OF
35
There is a storyboard here which explains why the north (left) canyon wall is so steep (93°) and the south (right) canyon wall is not (63°). It has to do with snow melt. The north side stays out of the sun and remamins frozen, whereas the south side thaws, seeps into the cracks, and then refreezes breaking apart the rock wall.
SLIDE NUMBER
21
OF
35
This plant was growing everywhere at this stop.
SLIDE NUMBER
22
OF
35
A closeup revealed this to be identified as Fireweed.
SLIDE NUMBER
23
OF
35
You can barely see the "pulpit" on the left in this photo.
SLIDE NUMBER
24
OF
35
The Pulpit is where this and the next photo was taken from.
SLIDE NUMBER
25
OF
35
SLIDE NUMBER
26
OF
35
There is still lots of road ahead of us.
SLIDE NUMBER
27
OF
35
Down this short trail...
SLIDE NUMBER
28
OF
35
...is the Chasm View Overlook.
SLIDE NUMBER
29
OF
35
I guess it's easy to see how it came by it's name.
SLIDE NUMBER
30
OF
35
SLIDE NUMBER
31
OF
35
This undoubtedly is the Painted Wall View.
SLIDE NUMBER
32
OF
35
Watch your step when you arrive at the end of this trail...
SLIDE NUMBER
33
OF
35
...because it's a long fall from the Dragon Point Overlook.
SLIDE NUMBER
34
OF
35
This photo is of the Sunset View Overlook and I can't imagine what this looks like at sunset.
SLIDE NUMBER
35
OF
35
Well the road has come to an end, but as you can see the river and canyon just keep going.
After you pass through the entrance gate you travel straight if you want to see the Visitor Center or the main RV campground. If you take a right, you'll begin a 7-mile journey down 1900' to the bottom of Black Canyon on East Portal Road to the smaller tent campground and the fishing spots on the Gunnison River.
BLACK CANYON OF THE GUNNISON NATIONAL PARK - EAST PORTAL SCENIC DRIVE
SLIDE NUMBER
1
OF
23
I'm sure glad we're not towing THE POD up or down this road. The park entrance road, which was very similiar to this, was about all ROVER could handle.
SLIDE NUMBER
2
OF
23
The road doesn't waste any time starting it's descent.
SLIDE NUMBER
3
OF
23
There are two constants on this drive, the winding curves and the steep descent.
SLIDE NUMBER
4
OF
23
If your brakes are failing, this is your first chance to get off the road.
SLIDE NUMBER
5
OF
23
Why does looking back up the road from the pullout not look so steep?
SLIDE NUMBER
6
OF
23
We still have a long way to go and a lot more steep curves to get there.
SLIDE NUMBER
7
OF
23
Alright! We're starting to see the river down below us.
SLIDE NUMBER
8
OF
23
But there are still a few pesky turns to negotiate before we get there.
SLIDE NUMBER
9
OF
23
We've finally made it to the bottom of the canyon.
SLIDE NUMBER
10
OF
23
A few miles passed the campground the road just dead ends.
SLIDE NUMBER
11
OF
23
I got ROVER turned around and ready for a quick getaway...
SLIDE NUMBER
12
OF
23
...while Tricia got closer to see what all the warning signs were all about.
SLIDE NUMBER
13
OF
23
The north side canyon walls are nearly vertical at this point of the canyon.
SLIDE NUMBER
14
OF
23
Wherever you have access to the water you're bound to see...
SLIDE NUMBER
15
OF
23
...people fishing!
SLIDE NUMBER
16
OF
23
SLIDE NUMBER
17
OF
23
SLIDE NUMBER
18
OF
23
Notice the steep incline the fisherman have to negotiate to reach the water.
SLIDE NUMBER
19
OF
23
Near the campground is this spillway.
SLIDE NUMBER
20
OF
23
SLIDE NUMBER
21
OF
23
Down river from the spillway seems to also be a good fishing spot.
SLIDE NUMBER
22
OF
23
The view downstream from the corner of the campground parking lot.
SLIDE NUMBER
23
OF
23
The campground was better suited for tent campers and very small trailers, so we don't have to worry about getting THE POD down here on our next visit.
SATURDAY - I hope everyone enjoyed their Fouth of July activities! We stayed put on the campsite all day yesterday and are itching to get back out into the park.
But we feel like we've seen most everything the National Park has to offer, so we're going to visit the park next door.
The Curecanti National Recreation Area butts up against the southeast corner of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. Technically, we've already visited a small section of the National Recreation Area when we drove to the end of East Portal Road.
The East Portal Campground is located in, and part of, the Curecanti National Recreation Area, but the only way to reach it is by driving through the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. It's kind of a unique situation!
We're going to go check out the scenery in the National Recreation Area, but we're also going to scout out 4 of their 10 campgrounds for possible future visits, it's just something we do with our spare time!
CURECANTI NATIONAL RECREATION AREA
SLIDE NUMBER
1
OF
20
The first campground you'll see when traveling west to east through park is the small 21-site Cimarron Campground. The campground itself is nothing special, but it does have this interesting road which exits the back of the campground.
SLIDE NUMBER
2
OF
20
At the end of that road you'll find the 468' tall and 720' wide Morrow Point Dam.
SLIDE NUMBER
3
OF
20
The dam is 52' thick at the base and 12' thick at the crest.
SLIDE NUMBER
4
OF
20
The dam holds back the Gunnison River and then slowly releases it to create this calm stream.
SLIDE NUMBER
5
OF
20
The NPS erected this bridge to allow hikers to enjoy both sides of the river.
SLIDE NUMBER
6
OF
20
The dam generates enough electricity to support the nearby communities.
SLIDE NUMBER
7
OF
20
At the parking lot there is a small picnic area that overlooks...
SLIDE NUMBER
8
OF
20
...the smaller Cimarron River as in joins the much larger Gunnison River.
SLIDE NUMBER
9
OF
20
The calm waters below the dam apparently make for some good fly fishing spots.
SLIDE NUMBER
10
OF
20
Here's a pair of hikers as they head out on their adventure.
SLIDE NUMBER
11
OF
20
On the way into the canyon we passed by this vintage narrow gauge train exhibit.
SLIDE NUMBER
12
OF
20
The road we drove in on today was once used as the railroad bed that this train traveled on.
SLIDE NUMBER
13
OF
20
You can just see the top of the dam in the background and the road used to access it.
SLIDE NUMBER
14
OF
20
We are back out on US-50 and headed deeper into the park.
SLIDE NUMBER
15
OF
20
The Gunnison River, behind the Marrow Point Dam and the Blue Mesa Dam, begins to get wider and deeper creating excellent boating and fishing opportunities..
SLIDE NUMBER
16
OF
20
We are now approaching the Blue Mesa Middle Bridge when US-50 changes sides.
SLIDE NUMBER
17
OF
20
It's easy to see why they call this body of water the Blue Mesa Reservoir.
SLIDE NUMBER
18
OF
20
There are kayaks, motor boats and sailboats everywhere you look. You can even see the Elk Creek Campground, our favorite today, in the background.
SLIDE NUMBER
19
OF
20
The shorelines also make for a great place to picnic, swim and fish.
SLIDE NUMBER
20
OF
20
This is someplace we will definately have to revisit and spend more time.
Looking for our Visited States Map and Data? How about our State by State Bucket Lists or Visited Campgrounds List? If so, click on the sign below to be taken to our other website.
Our first stop is at the Tomichi Point Overlook.
But if you take the time to hike down below the parking lot...
...the views get much better without all the shrubbery in the way.
Now that's more like it!
If you zoom way in you can even see the Gunnison River way down below.
This young buck came strolling out of the shrubs to check us out.
Our second stop was at the Visitor Center to get my Passport Book stamped.
There are two overlooks on this trail, one to the right and one to the left.
Most people today seemed to take the right hand trail to this overlook view.
Sure, you could see the rapids far down below...
...but this crumbling stone wall was blocking what I thought was the best view.
From the left side trail overlook you could see a longer stretch of the river...
...that had many more rapids to look at.
Once the river passes by the Visitor Center it enters a very narrow part of the canyon.
I think looking down the entrance to the left hand overlook may have scared off a few.
This comes up as Sulfer Buckwheat in our plant identification app.
This view is from the Pulpit Rock Overlook.
There is a storyboard here which explains why the north (left) canyon wall is so steep (93°)
This plant was growing everywhere at this stop.
A closeup revealed this to be identified as Fireweed.
You can barely see the "pulpit" on the left in this photo.
The Pulpit is where this and the next photo was taken from.
There is still lots of road ahead of us.
Down this short trail...
...is the Chasm View Overlook.
I guess it's easy to see how it came by it's name.
This undoubtedly is the Painted Wall View.
Watch your step when you arrive at the end of this trail...
...because it's a long fall from the Dragon Point Overlook.
This photo is of the Sunset View Overlook and I can't imagine what this looks like at sunset.
Well the road has come to an end, but as you can see the river and canyon just keep going.
I'm sure glad we're not towing THE POD up or down this road.
The road doesn't waste any time starting it's descent.
There are two constants on this drive, the winding curves and the steep descent.
If your brakes are failing, this is your first chance to get off the road.
Why does looking back up the road from the pullout not look so steep?
We still have a long way to go and a lot more steep curves to get there.
Alright! We're starting to see the river down below us.
But there are still a few pesky turns to negotiate before we get there.
We've finally made it to the bottom of the canyon.
A few miles passed the campground the road just dead ends.
I got ROVER turned around and ready for a quick getaway...
...while Tricia got closer to see what all the warning signs were all about.
The north side canyon walls are nearly vertical at this point of the canyon.
Wherever you have access to the water you're bound to see...
...people fishing!
Notice the steep incline the fisherman have to negotiate to reach the water.
Near the campground is this spillway.
Down river from the spillway seems to also be a good fishing spot.
The view downstream from the corner of the campground parking lot.
The campground was better suited for tent campers and very small trailers,
The first campground you'll see when traveling west to east through park
At the end of that road you'll find the 468' tall and 720' wide Morrow Point Dam.
The dam is 52' thick at the base and 12' thick at the crest.
The dam holds back the Gunnison River and then slowly releases it to create this calm stream.
The NPS erected this bridge to allow hikers to enjoy both sides of the river.
The dam generates enough electricity to support the nearby communities.
At the parking lot there is a small picnic area that overlooks...
...the smaller Cimarron River as in joins the much larger Gunnison River.
The calm waters below the dam apparently make for some good fly fishing spots.
Here's a pair of hikers as they head out on their adventure.
On the way into the canyon we passed by this vintage narrow gauge train exhibit.
The road we drove in on today was once used as the railroad bed that this train traveled on.
You can just see the top of the dam in the background and the road used to access it.
We are back out on US-50 and headed deeper into the park.
The Gunnison River, behind the Marrow Point Dam and the Blue Mesa Dam,
We are now approaching the Blue Mesa Middle Bridge when US-50 changes sides.
It's easy to see why they call this body of water the Blue Mesa Reservoir.
There are kayaks, motor boats and sailboats everywhere you look.
The shorelines also make for a great place to picnic, swim and fish.
This is someplace we will definately have to revisit and spend more time.
