National Parks Road Trip

This past year my friend Andrew(@tinswel ) and I went on a road trip leaving from Missouri and headed out west. We spent a good month or two planning our route. From past trips I've learned it always good to have multiple campsite options for each area incase the first option fails. And it will eventually! I created a video highlighting our stops at each beautiful location. Visit my new website https://wisdomtraders.us/ or my Youtube Channel Playlist : Explore More
(https://www.youtube.com/user/dduncan43/videos?view_as=subscriber")
to view more past adventures.

After a long 15 hour drive we were in Northwest New Mexico. We exited the Hwy and were on a dirt road in the middle of no where for what felt like forever. But finally we arrived at our first stop. Chaco Canyon National Historical Park.

Chaco Canyon is located in a remote canyon cut by the Chaco Wash. Containing the most sweeping collection of ancient ruins north of Mexico, the park preserves one of the most important pre-Columbian cultural and historical areas in the United States The canyon hosts the densest concentration of pueblos in the American Southwest. We explored many of the ruins and took part in guided tour.

Its always nice to do a guided tour and have a park ranger educate you about the area.

Our last hike in the park we chose to climb up and out of the canyon using the Pueblo Alto Trail.

A cold front came blowing in right as we reached the top. We debated for a second realizing we were under dressed for the drastic temperature drop. We decided to make a run for it. Our destination was a site called Jackson's Staircase. It was a little over a mile away. For how brutally cold it was, running full sprint through the dessert turned out to be a lot of fun.

We spent one day and night in Chaco Canyon and headed for Mesa Verde National Park that next morning. Mesa Verde is only 3 hours from Chaco Canyon. We were very grateful for a short drive that day. Mesa Verde contains over 5,000 known archeological sites including 600 cliff dwellings. We drove all through the park stopping at each archeological site along the way.

Our last site we visited was a cliff dwelling called Balcony House. It was a one hour ranger- guided tour. The tour involves climbing a 32-foot ladder, crawling through a 12-foot long tunnel, and climbing up a 60-foot (20m) open rock face with two 10-foot (3m) ladders to exit the site.

We camped in the parks designated sites that night with our minds captivated by the mysteries left behind by the pueblean people. The next morning we journeyed north to The Black Canyon of Gunnison National Park.

The park contains 12 miles of the 48-mile long Black Canyon of the Gunnison River. The national park itself contains the deepest and most dramatic section of the canyon, but the canyon continues upstream into Curecanti National Recreation Area and downstream into Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area. The canyon's name owes itself to the fact that parts of the gorge only receive 33 minutes of sunlight a day. We entered the park through the south rim entrance. We drove the the rim road stopping to do each short hike to the edge of the canyon. At the end of the rim road is the longest trail, Warner Point Nature Trail. Highly recommended. While on the trail you can look south and see the San Juan Mountain Range, Uncompahgre Valley, and Bostwick Park. To the north look you can see the West Elk Mountains, and at the end of the trail you can enjoy the views of the Gunnison River and the Black Canyon.

There are a couple camping options in the Black Canyon. You can camp next to your car on the top of the rim or down in the canyon along the river. We decided to hike down into the canyon to camp that night. We hiked down a road that is typically open in the spring and summer but that was currently closed. It was file miles STRAIGHT down.

The campground was completely empty giving us free range for choosing the best site. We set up camp then started exploring the river. Andrew bought a fishing license earlier that day and got to fish in one of the states best trout fishing rivers.

We woke up the next morning and got mentally prepared for the elevation gain we were about to take on. The hike out of the canyon, in my opinion, wasn't as painful on my body as hiking down. It took us about the same amount of time to hike in as it did to hike out. We got to see some deer as we finished the hike as well.

Our next stop was in Utah at Arches National Park. The park is home to over 2,000 natural sandstone arches. In addition to a variety of unique geological resources and formations. It contains the highest density of natural arches in the world. We drove the parks road system stopping a couple times then decided to hike Delicate Arch Trail.

We ended up camping outside the park off of the Colorado River near Moab. There is a road once you reach Moab that takes you along the river and offers many different sized campsites. We found our spot and set up camp right at sunset.

The next day we woke up early and headed north for Wyoming with the goal to reach Yellowstone National Park. We knew the drive was long so we split it up and found a spot to camp. We were also able to stop off in Salt Lake City, UT to experience the Natural History Museum.

The next day we arrived at Yellowstone. Yellowstone was the first national park in the United States. The park is well known for its wildlife and its many geothermal features. We reached the park in the later part of the afternoon. It started snowing as we pulled up to our first Bison filled field.

We continued driving into the park, which had only recently been plowed and opened that week. There was still snow all over the park. Since we arrived late we decided to pay for camping in the park and camp next to our vehicle. The next day we did a bunch of day hikes offering views and close encounters of the parks geysers. We also did an off trail hike that included being surrounded by bison and then ended with an opportunity to view wolves!

We saw a bunch of wildlife that day!

We finished our day soaking in the Boiling River. The boiling river is a small thermal river(hot) that flows into the Gardner River(freezing cold) where visitors can soak and relax in a natural hot tub. Its a balancing act trying to find the sweet spot between the two extreme temperatures.

After that amazing experience we went back to our car camping site and camped there again. The next morning we went to the visitor's center to ask about permits for back country camping. We had to watch a video going over safety and the risks of the park. Following the video we filled out a form with a ranger, showing that we are aware of the back country rules along with safety precautions. We chose a trail on the map that was available and reserved our backcountry campsite. On the drive to the trail head I kept thinking about all the different animals that could potentially kill us that night haha. I quickly put it out of my head realizing this wasn't going to help anything. The trail description seemed relatively easy. If I remember right the trail was only 2 to 3 miles to reach the campsite. After a few hours of hiking we reach out campsite designated by a bunch of elk antlers.

We climbed a big hill up out of our valley where we were camping. The sun started to set behind the mountains in the distance making for a perfect ending to the day. We got back to camp and were able to start a fire and cook dinner. We cleaned up camp as best as possible to avoid attracting any unwanted visitors. It took me a while to fall a sleep that night. That whole time in the back of my mind I couldn't stop thinking about bears or wolves finding our camp. Luckily I woke up alive with no signs of animals around our camp. We hiked back to our car at the trailhead that morning. We hit the road once again to continue our adventure south back down into Colorado. On our way out of the park we saw a bald eagle on the river side. We stopped and got out of the car and were able to watch as the eagle flew off into the distance. Later that day, conveniently, we were able to split the drive up by stopping and staying with a friend in Laramie, WY. It felt nice to stay in a warm home for a night. The next day we reached our final destination, Rocky Mountain National Park. Everything in the park was pretty much still closed due to it being early spring. We were able to do a day hike around snow covered Sprague Lake.

We ate lunch under a big pine tree where we came to the decision about camp for the night and then planned our journey back home. This had become one of my favorite adventures yet! A couple times in the story above we made stops between national parks and camped to help shorten the drive time.

I hope you all enjoyed reading this. If you have any questions about the trips details or want to share similar stories please comment below :)