Many of the signs that greet you when you cross the border to Colorado say: “Welcome to Colorful Colorado”. They really did get that right! Colorado is just amazing. Along all of our drives so far in the state we have seen just gorgeous landscapes that vary between alpine forests, mountains, plains, and more. It honestly seems like the state is one giant national park.
Our drive to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park (BCGNP) was no different. We headed through Vail and many other ski resort towns on our multiple hour drive to BCGNP. We were really excited for this park because everyone we spoke to about the park along our travels so far said just how awesome it was.
By the time we arrived at BCGNP it was early evening. The visitor center was closed so we headed to the camp ground and got a sweet campsite for the next two nights. In typical fashion we went to a ranger program that evening on the History of Camping in America. BCGNP is a certified dark sky location. While it was a little cloudy we still got to see an amazing night sky full of stars.
The next morning we stopped at the visitor center and then drove back into the closest town to get restocked on a few things. We stayed (and only visited) the south rim of the park. This seems to be the part that is most visited. So the main road in the part has a few awesome look out points that you hike short distances out to. They provide some amazing views of the canyon that is so deep and narrow that it looks black inside (hence the name).
Here are a few of our favorite stops along the way. Some of my favorite are the ones with views of the Gunnison river.
And they all have great names like “Painted Wall”:
At the end of the road there is a turn around where we (and most others) stopped for lunch before we went on a ranger lead hike. We met the park ranger and four other hikers (all from Holland) at the Warner Point Nature Trail.
We spent about 2 hours together with plenty of informative stops along the way about the history of the park, trees, birds, and you name it. At the end of the hike we were greeted with the highest point in the park.
We spent another great night in the park with night skies that are really hard to capture on an iPhone 6s, so you’ll just have to take our word for it. We were pretty sure we could make out the Milky Way.
The next day we headed to the Great Sands Dunes National Park. This was the final National Park in Colorado that we needed to visit!
The Great Sand Dunes just experienced some rather wet weather so what we could do was somewhat limited. There was a drive within the park we couldn’t do because the road was closed to flooding. The really only major thing to do is climb out on the sand dunes. You can also use a sled or “sand”board to slide down the dunes. However, since the dunes had been somewhat wet the local sled rental shop was not renting any out. Unfortunately we did NOT think to bring our own sled.
There are no trails and you are encouraged to just walk out onto the dunes and have fun. We decided we would hike one of the two big dunes. We hiked straight up to High Dune, which we realized now was the absolute steepest way possible and it was a lot further away when it looked at first.
To top it all off we were racing against a storm that looked like it was headed towards us. While we ended up not getting caught it in, it was unbelievably windy. Sand got everywhere. What they don’t tell you is sand will get in your ears and mouth as you are struggling to breath up that dune!
Afterwards we made our way down and decided to stay at the campground not in the park but right outside since we were in need of some showers.
The next morning we headed out towards Kansas. We stopped at a Bent’s Old Fort, a National Historical Site in La Junta, Colorado. While it wasn’t a main destination for us, it once was for travellers west on the Santa Fe trail. This was less of a fort and more of a supply center for some western travelers and frontiersmen such as Kit Carson.
We found out afterwards only a very, very small part of the fort was original, but the living history folks really committed to their characters so they made up for it.
This was our last stop in Colorado for this trip. We crossed off the all of the National Parks, didn’t have a single moment of dull scenery while driving, and can’t wait to come back! They seem to be obsessed with the state flag and I can see way, it’s pretty sweet.
Dietz Summer Road Trip 