Brian & Patty's Awesome Adventure!: Gunnison, Colorado

The City of Gunnison is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Gunnison County, Colorado. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 5,854. Interestingly it has a great museum. It took us two days to see it all!

Pioneer Museum

We stayed about 10 miles away in an RPI (Resorts Park International) park. The RPI parks normally just costs us $10.00 a night so they are a bargain. The park we stayed at is called Blue Mesa RV Ranch.

Blue Mesa RV Ranch

The campsites are rustic and have the native brush and plants around them. Ours is the RV with the awning out. Although you can't tell in this photo we did not have neighbors on either side of us so we had plenty of space.

Our Blue Mesa Campsite

We were assigned a space with our door and window facing towards the lake. Here is our view we saw out the window.

View of Blue Mesa Reservoir

It was hot while we were here so everyday we walked down to the pool. The water was warm and very enjoyable. Even went into the hot tub a few times.

Swimming Pool

Blue Mesa Reservoir is the largest body of water entirely in Colorado. It surprised us that even on the weekend there was never more then 2 or 3 boats in view at any one time. Can you imagine in California how many there would be??

Blue Mesa Reservoir

One of the main reasons we came to Gunnison is to see the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. The Gunnison is referring to the Gunnison River not the city of Gunnison.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison

Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park is a National Park located in western Colorado. The south rim entrance is located 15 miles east of Montrose. The park contains 12 miles of the 48-mile long canyon of the Gunnison River. The national park itself contains the deepest and most dramatic section of the canyon.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison

The canyon's name owes itself to the fact that parts of the gorge only receive 33 minutes of sunlight a day. Several canyons of the American West are longer and some are deeper, but none combines the depth, sheerness, narrowness, darkness, and dread of the Black Canyon.

The River Runs Through

There are a lot of turn outs from the road that you can just stop and take pictures. Also there are places that you can hike several hundred yards to a mile to get to viewpoints. This picture shows the visitor center. You can take photos from the visitor center or continue down the trail and get better shots. We took a picture of the center as we were heading back.

Visitor Center

We took this picture from the Visitor Center Trail. Quite impressive. I can understand why they call this the Colorado Grand Canyon!

Visitor Center Trail

This is called Painted Wall on the north side of the canyon. It is the tallest sheer cliff in Colorado at 2,250 feet. Lighter-colored pegmatite dikes are clearly visible.

Painted Wall

In 1909 a tunnel was built through the mountain to divert water to Montrose. Because workers needed to get to the tunnel to build it as well as ongoing maintenance a road was built.

East Portal Road 16%

The road is extremely steep (16% grades) with hairpin curves. Vehicles with an overall length greater than 22 feet are prohibited on the East Portal Road. My truck is about 22 feet +/-. It is also 8'1" wide and weighs about 8600 lbs. empty. I was advised (not mandated) not to take it down to the river by the ranger.

The Beast!

The ranger was concerned about braking down the 16% grade. What he did not know is how awesome the exhaust brake is on the new RAM trucks! I stuck the truck in Tow/Haul mode and also put on maximum Exhaust Brake. In the 5 miles of the downhill I touched my foot brake only 3 times! Pretty easy downgrade!

We got close to the bottom and saw the Crystal Dam overflowing. There is a lot of water in Colorado. To bad they can't ship it to drought stricken California!