Gunnison Colorado and
Crested Butte area

Gunnison Colorado is an off-the-beaten-path mountain town that is surrounded by mountains and forests that contain some great hiking trails. It's the college town where I went to school, (Western State College), and it makes a pretty good place to base yourself for hikes in the Gunnison and Crested Butte areas. Crested Butte has even been designated as the "wild flower" capital of Colorado.

Since Gunnison takes longer, (approximately 3 1/2 hours), to reach from Denver, you'll find fewer cars on the streets and fewer people on the hiking trails. We had one hiking trail almost to ourselves for most of that hike. Anyway, if you need directions to Gunnison, Colorado, they go like this: from Denver, follow U.S. Highway 285 to Salida and from there, follow U.S. Hwy. 50 west over Monarch Pass and on into Gunnison.

Once you get there, you'll need to know about Gunnison lodging so I'll let you know where we stayed. Also, if you've stayed in Gunnison before and had a good experience, do let me know about it :-).

And then of course, you might also want to eat out while you're in Gunnison. There are many more Gunnison restaurants now than when I went to school there. But I did find out that my favorite restaurant burned down. It was called the Cattleman Inn and if you remember it, it's no longer there. If they rebuild, I'll let you know. (Or if you find out before I do, you can let me know too.)

One thing you might like to do while you're in Gunnison Colorado is to take a ride on the Morrow Point Boat Tour. The boat travels through the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, passing by Chipeta Falls, the Curecanti Needle, and many other interesting things. I highly recommend it :-).

The Gunnison and Crested Butte areas are surrounded by the Gunnison National Forest and several wilderness areas so as you might guess, there are lots of places to hike. We've only hiked a few of the trails there so far, and plan on going back at some point, for more. Until then, I hope you enjoy the three hikes I've described so far. (See top paragraph.)

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