The Black Canyon of the Gunnison

 

We met Mom and Dad for breakfast. The desk clerk recommended Starvin’ Arvin’s. The portions were beyond huge! Kim and I shared a cinnamon roll that filled a normal sized dinner plate. I refuse to take pictures of food, but I should have in this instance. We then said our good byes to Mom and Dad and they headed back to Denver.

We decided to head to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. It is one of the newest National Parks being designated in 1999. I have been struggling to come up with the words to describe this canyon. The one word that came to my mouth as I looked over every vista was simply “WOW!!!” This place is beyond magnificent. These pictures just don’t do it justice. It was also a cool rainy day.

We took a bunch of pictures. The hard part is choosing which ones to show in this blog.

 

Here I am at one of the overlooks (Doing my best Captain Morgan pose):

The drive runs along the south rim of the canyon. There are many pulloffs and short walks to the overlooks. Most are between 100 feet and 400 yards. By the end of the day we had walked about 5 miles. It was well worth it.

The clouds were looking like it was going to rain and rain it did.

We just hung out in the truck and waited for it to pass. We then continued on with the sweet smell of sage in the air. Here is Kim on a distant rock.

 

 

The painted wall:

There were some people climbing on the rocks below one of the overlooks. Look close.

We then took the road to the bottom. It is about 7 miles long and has a 16% grade. I think it was the steepest road I have ever been on. This picture just does not do it justice.

You may ask, why did you want to go to the bottom? Well to fish of course…I
could see a large trout behind this rock and I wanted to go down to catch it;)

It was a most memorable day. I could only fish for a half hour because we had to make the drive to Montrose to go to church. I felt like I left one of God’s most beautiful churches to go to some man made building. No comparison. Many more adventures to come including more fishing and one aborted adventure.

Telluride and Ridgeway

The first day with Mom and Dad was a full day. The day after we decided to take it a little easier and make a trip to Telluride and see what else we could find along the way.

We stopped along the highway and took a few pics:

We are absolutely loving life!

We found the little town of Telluride very busy. The were many street vendors and a farmers market.

We decided to take the free Gondola to get a better look at the valley.

The views of the ski area and town were really neat. Her is one of Mom and Dad.

Mom was a bit scared of the gondola, but she was a trooper and made the trip. Kim and I got off at the top of the mountain to check that area out. Here is a double black Diamond on the face.

I am sure my brother Brian could tell you how steep this one is. Here are a few other shots from the top.

Check out the Telluride airport:

We then had lunch from some street vendors and headed back to Ridgeway. As you can see it was a cloudy and rainy day. The sun finally came out at the end of the day to illuminate the rocks that we could see from Ridgeway.

Another day with Mom and Dad was full of beautiful mountains cool temps. It was great to spend a couple of days with Mom and Dad and help them enjoy their Colorado mountains.

Ouray and Silverton and Visitors

My Mom and Dad joined us for a few days. They would not stay in our rig with us, so they got a motel room in Montrose. That is only about 15 miles away. I like Montrose. It is a nice sized town. Not too big and not too small.

We decided to head out in Mom and Dad’s Honda CRV for this day of touring. We started by driving the 20 miles or so to Ouray. Here are a few pics:

The town is totally surrounded by rock mountains. It is a beautiful setting.

Mom and Dad have never seen Ouray or the Million Dollar Highway. I think they were also impressed.

We then went to the Box Canyon Falls. That was very cool.

Here is a shot with Mom and Dad. I clearly need to go on a diet.

Looking up. The Box Canyon is tough to photograph.

This is just below the canyon. This is the hot springs that feed all of the hot springs in Ouray, which we would check out at the end of the day.

We left the Box canyon and headed out on the Million Dollar Highway to Silverton.

The scenery was awesome.

I have tons of pictures. It is hard to choose which ones to show.

I love orange flowers. I wonder why…

Then down into the town of Silverton. We had ice cream and went to see the train that had made the trip from Durango.

Right as I took that shot, the engineer blew the whistle. That was loud.

A couple of town shots of Silverton:

We then headed back to Ouray to soak in the Hot Springs Pools. We did have to stop and take a goo look at this waterfall.

We did not take any pictures of us soaking in the Hot Springs pool, but I am sure I would not show them if I did. I am working on that diet thing. Really I am…

After the Hot Springs, it was all I could do to get back to the rig and go to bed. It sure felt good.

I hear it is almost 100 degrees in Missouri this week. I am sorry to hear that, really I am. I have found that 75 degrees in the day and 45 –50 at night suits us just fine. I think I will stick with that. Stay cool, wherever you are.

Ridgeway State Park and a Dual Sport Ride

It was time to move on. So we left our “Best ever Campsite” and moved down in the Ouray area. We had heard the views were spectacular and we wanted to see for ourselves. Before we left we had visitors from Missouri. Daniel and Christine were in the area, so they stopped by for an hour or so. This was the first trip to Colorado for Christine. I think she was impressed. We left the Almont area and drove about 100 miles down to Ridgeway State Park. it is kind of open (no trees), but the place is very clean and we have full hookups. That is nice for a change. Here is a picture of our site:

The spacing between sites is very good. The best part is there is excellent fishing here in the park…or so I am told.

I did a little fishing with no luck, so i decided to take a dual sport ride to explore the area.

I chose a route up to Owl Creek Pass. This was a 2 wheel drive road and was fun to ride on. The views were amazing. Note the Owls head on the far left.

 

Here is a closer view of the Owl. Notice the storm clouds just starting to brew.

Made it to the top. That is 4000 feet in about 18 miles.

Here is an up-close view of the owl.

A little dark, but the formations were just awesome.

We are here to see the aspens turn. This looks like a good spot.

This is the canyon down by town.

It was an awesome trip and was only about 70 miles. Now I have to take Kim up there. We are expecting visitors for the next couple of days, I can’t wait for more beautiful mountain views. Enjoy your day!