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Along the Rim of the Gunnison Gorge

Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area | Sunday, May 8, 2022

After spending yesterday morning on the Gunnison River in the Dominguez – Escalante National Conservation Area, I decided to head out early this morning to get in a couple of short hikes along the rim of the Gunnison Gorge since I’ve wanted to spend more time exploring this area. I left home in the dark and made my way through Delta to Olathe and then headed east into the Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area where I stopped to take a short hike up the Eagle Valley Trail just after sunrise to start the day.

Here are a couple different views from the Eagle Valley Trail as the sun was coming up this morning.

Eagle Valley Trail

Eagle Valley View

Eagle Valley Trail Overview

Upper Eagle Valley Trail

While this is also a motorcycle and mountain bike trail, I enjoyed the hike early in the morning before anyone else showed up with their motors.

Eagle Valley Trail View

Eagle Valley Trail Overhang

The trail passes through a short section of narrows that is pretty cool.

Narrow Canyon

Down The Narrows

Eagle Valley Narrows Lines

Eagle Valley Trail Narrows

Twisted Narrows

This large clay hill was looking nice in the morning light when I returned to the trailhead.

Clay Hills

After returning to my Jeep I drove over to the Duncan Trailhead so I could hike parts of both the Duncan Trail and Bighorn Trail which follow closely along the rim of the Gunnison Gorge.

The Duncan Trail

Duncan Trail

Although you can follow the Duncan Trail all the way down to the Gunnison River, I didn’t feel like doing that today, so I just walked over to an overlook of the gorge right before the trail started it’s steep descent.

Gunnison River Morning

Along The Rim

Along The Rim

Looking down to the Gunnison River below.

The Gunnison River

The Bighorn Trail offered many nice views of the Gunnison Gorge from a couple different overlook areas.

The Gorge

Gunnison Gorge

Black Canyon Layers

Black Canyon Layers

Here’s one last view of the Gunnison Gorge Wilderness as I hiked back to the trailhead and then headed home before lunchtime.

Gunnison Gorge Wilderness

>> Along the Rim of the Gunnison Gorge Photo Gallery

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