Exploring Black Canyon of the Gunnison
Black Canyon of the Gunnison is one of the USA's deepest canyons. It's located in western Colorado, quite in the middle of nowhere. If you were to google the top deepest canyons in the USA then for some reason Black Canyon of Gunnison isn't listed in these countdowns. I just checked the first two results, it's weird, it clearly should be included. Maybe it's just so under the radar place and not known that much.
Top 6 deepest canyons in the USA
- Hells Canyon, Oregon/Idaho (8042ft)
- Sequoia and Kings Canyon, CA (8000ft)
- Grand Canyon, Arizona (6093ft)
- Waimea Canyon, Hawaii (3000ft)
- Black Canyon of Gunnison (2722ft) was not included in the list...
- Zion Canyon, Utah (2640ft)
I read from several places that the Black Canyon of Gunnison is the second deepest canyon in the USA, I agree...
Hells Canyon and Sequoia are officially named canyons but these places really look like huge mountain ranges with a river in the middle. When I think of the word Canyon, I mean huge vertical walls and a massive abyss in the ground, Hells Canyon and Sequoia look nothing like that. This is why I think many don't consider these as real canyons. Waimea is USA but not the mainland so it is often excluded from the list. So you see where I'm getting at. Black Canyon of Gunnison is not officially the second deepest but at the same time, it quite is lol😀
Ok, enough about that, I just needed to bring this out. Let's go to the actual hike and exploration. Black Canyon of the Gunnison has two sides you can explore. The south and north sides. You can see largely the same views on both sides but the south side is much more popular and more easily accessible. We visited the north side because our last night's accommodation was on the other side. We spent the night on some classic American farm, it was really cool to stay there!
It made sense for us to go to the north side due to the accommodation and where we drove next. It's also very few people on that side.
To get to our first viewpoint, a bit of hiking had to be done. We parked our car at the ranger station and it was about a 2km hike to make it to the viewpoint. The first two photos have been taken on the trail. It didn't take long until we saw our first glimpse of this canyon.
I had never seen a canyon remotely this size before so I was extremely interested.
There was quite a bit of trekking to do before we arrived. The weather was also quite hot, about 27C.
And finally, there we were. The sight that appeared was quite honestly, otherworldly. It's so large and deep that my brain was unable to process it well, just an incredible sight. This spot is called the Exclamation Point. Photos absolutely don't do any justice here because you have no idea about the scale of the canyon.
I was trying to peek down from the vertical edge. It was crazy, it made my head spin a bit because it's just so high. I was staring about 800m straight down, it's almost a full kilometer!! It was scary but so incredible at the same time.
Clouds and sun regularly made lighting conditions in the canyon different so I took several photos of the same place.
We sat around there for a while but had to start moving eventually. We still had a lot of viewpoints to see of this canyon's north side. The other viewpoints didn't require a hike.
Here are some more photos of the hiking back.
Saw a rabbit. Pretty good camo, hard to spot but it wasn't scared of us at all. I went really close to get a photo and the rabbit barely moved. That's a trait that will get this rabbit eaten soon enough by some eagle or something.
I still have a lot of photos of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison from other viewpoints but I will make a separate post on these. This has gotten long enough. It was such an amazing place that it deserves a lot of photos taken. Many of the views from other viewpoints were even more epic that you saw in this post, stay tuned!
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This looks cool ... it can be cool to stay there with a tent and listen to the voice of the canyon at night 🍷👌👌👌
Yeah, I bet. Many animals there too.
Very true 👌👍
These kind of places are so foreign for us Nordic people, truly a different world. So cool you get to experince this in real life and capture photos to look back on.
Yeah, extremely foreign sight. I'm used to seeing mountains and stuff but canyons like this, that's something totally different.
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Very good shots. You have captured the scenery very beautifully.
Thanks!
Nice shots!👍 The place looks so deep, woohoo! You captured that rabbit so well, just look how cute it looks 😍
It's extremely deep, I had never seen a canyon like this before. It was amazing.
Great shots and equally a great post, this looks like such a stunning place to visit, one I've never heard of until today. Excellent work :-)
Thanks! I had not heard about it before my trip too. This place goes under the radar for sure.
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Oh boy. I think a lot of heads will spin looking down from that height.
Definitely. At least I had a tree to hold onto. I wouldn't have dared to stand on the edge otherwise.
Great pictures of a beautiful location.
Thank you!
Was looking forward to this one! Such an underappreciated US landmark. The striations through the rock canyon are so unique compared to the canyons of the US Southwest.