Black Canyon on the Gunnison

We left Mesa Verde and drove over the Million Dollar Highway to Ouray.  The next morning we visited the historic courthouse where, among other things, the John Wayne version of True Grit was filmed in this courtroom.  The courthouse still has the original safes from the 1880's and still uses them.  Note the seats in this courtroom.







Outside our lunch spot we came upon this moth which was about two inches long with a long nose to suck the nectar.











We  continued on to the South Rim Campground at the Black Canyon of the Gunnison.  The next morning Joe, Bob and I walked on the Oak Flat trail (a misnomer since it descends 400' into the canyon) below the visitor center.  We then drove the road at the rim and stopped at most of the look outs.













                   The Gunnison River is only 40' wide at its narrowest point and is rated as Class V or unnavigable.  It drops up to 95'/mile (the Grand Canyon drops at an average of 7'/mile).  The rock it is eroding is very hard.  Originally it was covered by volcanic ash and rock expelled by the Elk Mountains.  The river easily cut through that rock and then once it hit the hard rock was committed to its route.  The two sides of the canyon are different.  The north side is vertical and the south side is on a slant.  This is because the south rim faces north and retains more moisture which causes more erosion.  The first people to try and run the canyon were railroad surveyors.
 The people who ultimately succeeded in running the canyon (searching for the proper site for a tunnel to divert water to the Uncompaghre Valley) used rubber rafts and floated down.  This view is of the Painted Wall (the light intrusions in the rock are formed when different rock pushes into the cracks).  There is a better view of Painted Wall below.
































 At the end of the road we began to walk out to a point that overlooked Montrose and the Uncompaghre Valley.  There we encountered this amazing Yellow Collared Lizard (he's about 10" long from nose to tail).  It was very hot, so we returned to our campers to sit out the heat and to await the afternoon thunderstorm.







The next morning we drove down to the East Portal (17 percent grade) at the upstream (east) end of the canyon.  Bob, Joe and Vera had gotten fishing licenses and were going to fly-fish for brown trout.  I was going to walk along the river.  The description of the trail listed it as strenuous because you had to clamber over a hard intrusion into the river which was steep and had a lot of exposure.  I got up and about 3/4s of the way down before I turned back because my legs weren't long enough.  I walked back up the road to Crystal Dam (2 miles) which controls the water released into the Black Canyon.  The fishermen were unsuccessful, but had a good time anyway.
We joined a ranger hike in the mid-afternoon to learn about the construction of the Gunnison Diversion Tunnel in 1905-1912.  It runs six miles underground and was constructed by the Corps of Engineers.  They were so accurate that the two sides met and were only 3" off (it is listed on the Engineering Masterpieces of the world along with Hoover Dam).  There was a town in East Portal with a school, hospital, general store, and housing.  There is a retaining dam to raise the water for the diversion tunnel which is made of wood and is 12' high and collapses like a book closing so that it can be checked twice each year and so that trees can be removed.  The tunnel has worked flawlessly since
its construction during the summer months.  In the winter it is opened about every two weeks to fill the municipal water tanks in Montrose.

This picture shows the inlet (900 cfs) with electric poles to deter the fish from entering the tunnel since they have just constructed a small hydro-power facility where the tunnel exits into the Uncompaghre Valley.

In the evening we drove into Montrose to a saloon/music venue to her Tom Russell, a fabulous guitar player and composer.  He was playing with another fabulous guitar player from Portland.  His songs were wonderful and the music was great in a small venue.  We all bought CDs to enjoy for the rest of the trip.