Our Experience at Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park

By Jacob

The first destination of our short June 2021 Colorado Adventure was Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park near Montrose, Colorado. Black Canyon is an extremely deep and narrow canyon; because of its steepness parts of the canyon get only a few minutes of sunlight a day, hence the name. From the town of Montrose, it takes 24 minutes to reach the South Rim Visitor Center. Along Highway 50 you will see a couple of signs pointing to Highway 347 that goes to the rim. The road rises up to the top of Mesa with a large farming area. The road rises more until on the right side of the road you spot the sign for Black Canyon National Park.

The park sign has a cool picture of Black Canyon. We of course stopped to take a picture by the park sign. Right around the corner is the park entrance station. For 7-day passes the fees are as follows: Vehicle Pass $30, Motorcycle Pass $25 and Pedestrian/Cyclist $15. Black Canyon National Park Annual Pass is $55. With our America the Beautiful Pass for $80 park admission was free. Moving past the entrance station we stopped at the first overlook, Tomichi Point. We parked the truck and moved to the edge of the rim. Before us was a truly stunning sight. For several miles we could see the winding canyon with steep black walls and a small section of the Gunnison River a couple thousand feet below us. The landscape was truly striking. We took it in for a few minutes and decided to move on to the visitor center. We found and parked at a parking spot and took the short hike down to Gunnison Point just beyond the visitor center. This overlook was on a rock peninsula that went out into the canyon for a commanding view. The walls were even steeper here, the bottom of the canyon was covered in shadow from the huge walls. We could hear the Gunnison River and the rapids flowing down from below us. We figured it took a couple of seconds for the sound to even reach us due to the immense depth of the canyon.

We then hiked back up to the visitor center. The store was open but had a very small area due to Covid restrictions. The one shirt I liked they did not have which was disappointing. In front of the visitor center there was a ranger stationed to help park visitors with any questions. We found out that the East Pasotral Road down into the canyon was closed. This was very disappointing as this is something we wanted to do. We decided to hike the 2.0 mile Oak Flat Trail at the visitor center. The hike is considered strenuous and goes below the rim without going to the bottom, which requires a permit.

We started our hike heading down steep switchbacks and stairs with incredible views of the winding canyon. There were only a couple of other people on the hike with us. The trail has a lot of vegetation, we felt like we might need longer pants as we were super itchy after the hike. Every few yards there were marvelous views of the canyon through trees and rocks. The hike has some challenging sections but it was not too difficult. There were a couple of narrow bridge wash crossings. If you are paying attention you will be fine. We thoroughly enjoyed our hike, but when we came back my watch read 1.5 miles and AllTrails says the loop is 1.3 miles. This loop is definitely 2.0 miles as advertised by the park.

After our hike we decided that we would make our way to some of the overlooks and hike to Warner Point at High Point, the end of the road. We made our way along the road to stop at Pulpit Rock. At this view point you get a view of a wider section of the canyon. On the right side it was less steep and had more vegetation. On the left was the towering black rock. This overlook had great views of the Gunnison River. Our next overlook is the best in the park and the one I had been looking forward to the most. The Painted Wall Overlook is the site of the tallest cliff in Colorado. This massive vertical wall is twice the height of the Empire State Building with what appears to be lines of paint across the wall. This was the most magnificent view in the park. If you do only one thing in the park make sure this is it.

We made our way to the end of the road and snatched the last available parking space. We decided to hike to Warner Point. This trail has more of a rolling steep hill feel. Lots of up and down. We could see Montrose way down from the mountain we were hiking. We made it to Warner Point which made us feel like we were in the middle of the canyon. The two rims of the canyon led to massive black rock views and the river. The Rocky Mountains beyond the turn of the canyon added more to the scenery. It was a great hike to end our short time in Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park. We made our way back down to Montrose satisfied that we had seen this hidden national park gem.