Cross Mountain Gorge

The entrance to Cross Mountain Gorge

Over the weekend Mel and I drove out to North-West Colorado to check out the Yampa River. The Yampa is a tributary of the Green, which eventually joins the Colorado. It's a tranquil river flowing placidly through high-desert valleys until it reaches the Cross Mountains. It then changes abruptly in character and slices a two-thousand foot gorge straight through the range. This makes for a nice five mile section of boating.

We ran this section on Saturday and all was uneventful, except for a little swim Mel took in the very last rapid. We then hiked over the top of the crest back to the truck. On the hike we surprised some elk that were bedded down in the juniper and spruce trees. We also got to peer over the canyon rim and see the gorge in it's entirety. We also saw tons of fox, antelope, deer, and rabbits. Cota was a big fan of chasing the rabbits.