A steep and shadowy gorge that cuts across the juniper and sagebrush encrusted landscape with rolling dark green waters far below. And a mountainside hike to a plunging cascade amid the autumn colors and clear blue sky.
Days at Park: Fri - 14 Sep 2018
Base Camp: Super 8 - Montrose, Colorado
Expedition Parks: Black Canyon of the Gunnison, Mesa Verde, Canyonlands, Arches
Point of Embarkation: Denver, Colorado
Although it is over five hours by car from the Denver International Airport to Montrose, the drive across Colorado as autumn begins to paint the mountainsides is anything but monotonous. The highway leads past the mountain resorts of Breckenridge and Vail, through gorges, alongside rivers, and sometimes tunnels through the mountains themselves. Further west, on the other side of the Rockies, the landscape changes as you enter the high mesa country. In an earlier expedition, also undertaken during the fall, I had fallen in love with the scenery of Colorado and this drive only reinforced my opinion that this is some of the most beautiful country.
Canyon Floor
Where the Gunnison River begins to flow through the Black Canyon there is a former service road that allows you to drive down to the canyon floor upstream of where the darkened walls become drastically steep. Here the placid river falls lazily over a dam creating a scenic backdrop to numerous fishing and picnic locations but not much in the way of hiking opportunities.
South Rim Area
Back up on the rim of the canyon, near the visitor center, were the first opportunities to get my hiking shoes dirty. The short walk to Gunnison Point provides some breathtaking views of the gorge and the river far below, as you walk over ground and amid rocks that are studded with sparkling pieces of schist. The Oak Flat Trail begins with a steep descent from the rim followed by a delightful circuit through the foliage sometimes hugging the canyon walls. Step up to the very edge to get sights of the contrasting sides of the canyon, the steep northern side and the more sloping southern side. The drive down South Rim Road allows numerous overlooks to stop and admire the canyon particularly the Painted Wall where the dark gneiss rock is striped with lighter-colored pegmatite. My favorite sight was always of the dark green Gunnison river with its many white foaming rapids so far at the bottom of this deep trench that it appeared not be moving at all.
Warner Point
At the end of the road, at a place called High Point, is the trail that leads to Warner Point. Here the trail back to the canyon rim is marked by juniper trees and sagebrush at the end of which I enjoyed sitting perched on the rocks at the edge of the gorge. I never tired of looking almost straight down to the bottom, a distance greater than the tallest skyscrapers in the country, as birds of prey wheeled in the sky halfway below me.
Bear Creek Falls
Along the way through the mountains between Montrose and Cortez, lies the resort and town of Telluride and a memorable hike on the trail that follows Bear Creek up to the waterfalls of the same name. I parked the car in the last spot of the Mountain Village Gondola Parking Garage and took a series of free gondolas all the way to the town of Telluride. Off season for the skiers, it was largely crowd free being peopled only by the dirt bikers and fellow hikers. From here a short walk through town to the end of Pine Street where the trailhead is located and the ascent began. Every step of this hike was an uphill one along a wide well-traveled dirt track, past the lower falls and an array of cairns. The trail narrows at the approach to the upper falls where some scrambling is involved to get to the base. There is a narrow way that leads up and over the falls where the intrepid wanderer can continue the journey, but I had other destinations to make that day and retraced my steps back down the mountainside.
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