Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park

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Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park fell into the "what even is that?" category. We don't really research parks ahead of time, so all we had to go off of was the name, and that name was meaningless to us.


For those in same predicament, I can now help. The Gunnison is a river. It runs through a canyon. That canyon is very steep and very narrow, which prevents light from getting in much of the day. Hence, Black Canyon of the Gunnison!

The reason this is a national park is because of the large depth and narrow width of the canyon. There are deeper canyons, and there are narrower canyons, but there are supposedly none with the combined depth and lack of width of the Black Canyon.
 

The road-accessible part of this park is quite small. The scenic drive on the south rim (the more popular side) is only 7 miles. It is dotted with overlooks. Our visit consisted of driving this road and stopping at every one of them.

The only opportunity for getting down into the canyon was with a permit. There are no maintained trails, so it's generally only climbers that do this.





We did one moderate hike at the end of the road. We then ended the day by driving down to the river and skipping some rocks.

This was a very laid back park, but we appreciated that.

Location: Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, Colorado, USA

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