Black Canyon of the Gunnison and Western Colorado

Between the time we went to Canyonlands and Lake Powell, we drove in the opposite direction for 5 days. I had some business to look into in Colorado and we visited half a dozen small towns i had never been too. We also stayed two days in Denver. During that time we stayed in Glenwood Springs, Denver, Ouray and Durango, briefly visiting a few others along the way.

Glenwood Springs

Glenwood Springs lies in a steep sided valley where the Colorado River is joined by the Roaring Fork River, coming down from up near Aspen. At this point the Colorado looks like you can walk across it.

There are several hot springs around Glenwood Springs (and this whole area of the state), the most famous of which supplies this large swimming pool.

 Across the street from the hot pool is the historic Hotel Colorado, built in 1893 and famous as a luxury resort visited by several Presidents.

 I liked it because it reminded me of the Shining and other large historic hotels like the ones in Glacier Park.

 Luxury hallways of the 1890's.

There is all kinds of stuff on the walls to look at.

 Large wooden stairwells.

Glenwood Springs is also known for being the supposed grave site of Doc. Holliday. This is only a monument in the pioneer cemetery because the exact grave is not known. Doc Holliday attended the gunfight at the OK Corral and was friends with Wyatt Earp.

There are offerings of money and playing cards around the edges of the grave, so that the Doc can continue to gamble his death away in the afterlife. Also, he was a huge fan of AVIATION. I did not see any teeth.

Nearby is the grave of Kid Curry, who rode around Butch Cassidy and was known as the wildest of the Wild Bunch gang. Apparently he murdered at least 9 law officers. That's a lot. He has a pretty interesting story. He had already done a lot by the time he met Butch, including busting out of jail in Deadwood. There's a plaque nearby with a quote from  medical examiner describing "his whole appearance marks him as a moral coward...ever line in his face indicates a degenerate." 

Aspen

We went to Aspen for a few hours but i accidentally deleted the pictures i took there. Oh well, Aspen was kind of a disappointment. The residential parts of the town look nice but the mountains around the town are remarkably boring and the commercial portions certainly cater to the rich.

Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park

On our way to Ouray we had a semi-long day of driving from Denver. We drove right past Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, which is a small out of the way National Park, so we figured we should not pass up the chance to see it. Unfortunately as soon as we got to the canyon we were swamped by a big rain storm. Because of that there wasn't  much to do other than run out of the car to overlooks and run back to the car.

 The Gunnison River through Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park drops at an average of 95 feet per mile. By comparison, the Colorado River through Grand Canyon National Park drops an average of 7.5 feet per mile. The river cuts through 2 billion year old precambrian gneiss, marbled with pinkish bands of  a granite like rock called pegmatite.

The canyon is 2,700 feet deep and as narrow as 1,000 feet across the top. It's definitely breath taking. The river looks small but it's as big as the Colorado is east of the confluence in Grand Junction. The narrowest point in the bottom is only 40 feet wide, which is getting in the neighborhood of Zion's narrows!

There are trails to the bottom that are only 1 mile long, but expect up to 4 hours to get back out.

Ouray

The town i enjoyed most on this trip was Ouray. At this point i would say it's the most scenic town i've seen in Colorado, other than Estes Park. Cradled in a deep bowl in the San Juan Mountains, the old gold mining town has a population of only 800 people. Geographically it's only 10 miles from Telluride but to travel by paved road it's a distance of at least 50 miles. There is a spectacular jeep ride called the Alpine Loop Trail that connects the towns of Telluride, Ouray, Silverton and Lake City.

We stayed in the historic St. Elmos Hotel. 

St. Elmos claims to have been in operation continuously since 1898.

The rooms are all different and are rumored to be haunted. They certainly have the look, and their are no televisions to distract you from wandering spirits.

 The Beaumont Hotel across the street also looked very nice.

 Early morning promised to be a sunny day! It had rained a lot through the night. Notice all the dead pines from beetle kill. They present a large fire hazard to the town and are currently a major downer on the aesthetics.

 There is a short really cool trail in Ouray to a hidden waterfall in Box Canyon.

It's a noisy slot canyon that appears to have formed along a fault line that produces a hot springs as well.

 This is about as close as you can get to the falls without being in a windy cold water mist.

From above this is where the water enters and falls through a tunnel. There a really weird junction of rocks where it occurs.

 You can continue through this tunnel and follow the "Perimeter Trail" back to town, or you can turn around.

 One side of town is dominated by this huge wall of rock that stretches all the up above treeline.

 Our last view of Ouray before we headed over towards Silverton.

Ouray claims to be the Switzerland of America, so i guess this is supposed to be what Switzerland looks like.

 Another cool waterfall that's easy to miss.

 Silverton. We did not have enough time to visit.

 The highlands of the San Juans. At this point it actually was starting to look like Switzerland.

 Durango

Our last stop in Colorado was the town of Durango. Population 16,000. It's outside the mountains but only an hour away from that last picture of the San Juans. It has a nice climate and is at an elevation of 6,512 feet., so all the tree covered hills you see here are considerably higher than that. The town was founded by the Denver and Rio Grand Railroad as a service town for the nearby mining districts. It's named after Durango, Mexico. Durango, Mexico is named after Durango, Spain. The word means "water town". Shortly after our trip the Animus River was choked with highly toxic orange water erupting out of an abandoned mine in the mountains.

 Durango also has it's share of cool historic hotels and buildings. I think this was the Strater Hotel.

I was busy and short on time in Durango, but i did go for an evening walk on the edge of town. It seemed like a nice town. The next day we made our long drive to Escalante, Utah.