Camping at Red River Gorge

This last weekend we made a trip to the Red River Gorge geological area within the Daniel Boone National Forest in Kentucky.  From Bloomington, this is only a 3.5 - 4 hour drive so perfect for a weekend adventure!

The Map

Everything that was critical to this adventure was found on this linked map.  Topography would have been nice but we had fun being surprised by cliffs, steep climbs and sort of discovering the layout of the gorge by scoping locations we had been to from the high points.

Camping

This is a great place to camp.  We found several excellent primitive sites throughout the area, and the "Koomer Ridge" campground was also reasonably priced at 20 a night with nice gravel tent pads and pack hanging poles.  The spots in Koomer Ridge were very far apart, quiet, and also all connected to the Koomer Ridge trail, the Sheltowee Trace trail (stretches for 250 miles point to point) and the rest of the trail system.  We decided to try these out on Saturday night and used it as a base for our Sunday morning run.


The spots we used on Friday night up on Tunnel Ridge Road were even better.  At several points along the gravel road close to trailheads are small gravel lots with a modern pit toilet and a trail leading back to two or three isolated campsites with no evidence marking the site but a primitive fire ring made of rocks.  A five dollar "three day" back country parking pass purchased from local stores in the town of Slade nearby is the only cost associated!  These are  right next to the southmost "cliff" of the gorge so were a great place to start a run on the trails from.


We've also been working on our efficiency of tent setup, so I decided the process could use a little post-setup video analysis.

Departing from these campsites, we ran and hiked pretty much every marked trail in the park from Friday evening to Sunday morning, and used our limited climbing skills to climb up a few large rock, arch and cliff formations along the way.  This ended up totaling around 25 - 30 miles for the weekend, with a great mix of terrain.  The trails included lots of scenic rock bridges connecting ridge top cliff trails along what I would consider the "Grand Canyon" of the midwest.


I just started compiling the numerous photos I collected along the trails, so a follow up with my favorites will be my next post.