Wednesday, June 27th - Black Canyon of the Gunnison

This morning I ran a few errands: picked up a spray bottle of Simple Green, bought ten, 2 cent stamps (to go with my ten, 39 cent stamps, bought test strips to test the quality of the RV coolant. Freightliner says that if the coolant tests chemically OK, then I don't have to change it until the coach is five years old (it is almost three years old now).

The coolant tested out perfect! I will test again next month. In fact, I every time I check my house 6 volt batteries, I will check the coolant. I then sprayed Simple Green into the radiator and the aftercooler, a second cooling device. The aftercooler can only be accessed from underneath the rear end of the coach. Then I sprayed water to clean the cooling fins of both the radiator and the aftercooler. It was a messy job but, hopefully, that effort will payoff in a cooler running engine. Remember the overheating problems I had last Saturday?

After a delightful lunch in downtown Montrose at Gigi Ann's, we drove out to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.

We had last visited the Canyon in August 2000 on our return trip to Austn from my Las Vegas consulting engagement. At that time, we camped at 8,000 feet inside the park and were awoken from a sound sleep by a tremendous display of lightning and thunder. MA and I just sat on the sofa of our 31' Minnie Winnie and marveled at the chilling display of nature's power.

This time, however, it is a bright 97 degree, partly cloudy day. The Jeep top is on but all the windows are removed or rolled down as we drive. After the National Park entrance gate (which, by the way, we pay nothing due to our Golden Age Passport), we turn right onto East Portal Road. We did not take this road in 2000. The descent into the Canyon is VERY steep - 16% grade and very curvy. But the road is paved. We drove as far as we could - until we got to Crystal Dam which controls the water flow of the Gunnison River into the Black Canyon.

In the early 1900's, a six mile long tunnel was dug in this area to divert some water from the Gunnison River into the Uncompaghre Valley so that otherwise arid and unusable land could be farmed. The water was SO close but, inaccessable due to the Canyon. The tunnel is still in use today and the Valley is green and fertile.

We drove back to the top, the Rim Road. We went only as far as the Visitors Center this time. We watched a movie on the Black Canyon and took these pix.