Black Canyon Of The Gunnison National Park

Black Canyon Of The Gunnison National Park


On the trip to Telluride for a two-day festival, my friend and I had to drive right through Gunnison which is home to a National Park we wanted to check out. Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park was such a please surprise! I’m really glad we stopped by on our way back to Denver. Lucky for us we got free entry since it was 100th-year celebration of America’s National parks!

Background info on Black Canyon

The National Park is located in the western part of Colorado and the park itself is Black Canyon that was formed from the Gunnison River. There are three parts to the canyon. You have the north and south rim which both offer spectacular views of the canyon. You also have a bottom part where you drive down the canyon and get to the river. Whether you are up top or down bottom, both views of the park are absolutely stunning.

The rims mostly consist of viewpoints that you can easily pull over and spend about 5 minutes looking at each one. Everything is relatively accessible with the rims just having one road that goes around from viewpoint to viewpoint.

Favorite Views

What was supposed to be an hour or two stop turned into several hours. We were able to view the entire north rim, which is the main road, and some of the bottom by the river.

Here were our personal favorite viewpoints of Black Canyon:

  • Painted Wall View
  • Devils Lookout
  • Gunnison Point
  • Dragon Point

Each view offers a different perspective on the canyon. This national park is perfect for a daytime adventure or a weekend long camping trip. Even the four hours we spent there seemed to be a decent amount of time to see the park. Of course, we wish we could have stayed longer, but we still had a bit of journey to make it back to Denver.