Round Trip Distance: 4.5 miles
Difficulty: Moderate
Skill level:
Elevation: 5891 - 5448 feet
Cellphone: 3-5 bars
Time: 2 hrs.
Trailhead: Third Flats
Fee: none
Attractions: Multi-use trail
The Twist-N-Shout trail is located in the Third Flats section of the BLM Bangs Canyon Management Area. The Third Flats Area doesn't have an official parking area. There are signs near the entrance that direct people to the Bangs Canyon Staging Area to park. The area around the kiosk is all posted 'No Parking'. With that said, most people who use the area either park on the hill on the west side of Little Park Road or if they have a high clearance vehicle they drive past the trailhead kiosk and park in one of the spots a little further in.
The BLM has a nice map of the Third Flats trails that is real handy to printout and take along with you.
The start of the Twist-N-Shout trail is on the left about 500 feet down the Third Flats road from the main kiosk. The trail is open to pretty much everything except jeeps. I haven't had any close encounters on the trails but if a person was to be listening to their favorite tunes I suppose they might not get as much warning as they would otherwise. Of course, they probably wouldn't be able to hear a rattlesnake either.
The trail starts out by traveling around the north side of the hills along the Third Flats road.
If you parked on the west side of Little Park Road and are measuring your distance from that point then you will come to the first fork in the trail where the Short Shot trail begins. Keep to the left at this point to remain on Twist-N-Shout.
The Twist-N-Shout trail switches back to the west at this point and begins gradually losing altitude as it bends around the drainage along the hillside.
Next the trail starts turning back to the northeast in the direction of Mt. Garfield and the Grand Mesa.
Stay to the left when you come to the junction of the Nut-N-2-It trail. The Nut-N-2-It trail leads south back to the Third Flats road. If you wanted to cut your hike short you could take that route.
The Twist-N-Shout trail continues pleasantly meandering around the hills and gullies until it reaches its end at the beginning of the Butterknife trail. Follow the right fork at this point and continue back to the Third Flats road on the Rocky Stumble trail.
From this vantage point you can see a sweeping view of the east end of the valley. If you look closely you can also get a glimpse of the Gunnison River as it travels just south of Orchard Mesa.
There are 2 'Y' forks in the Rocky Stumble trail. Both directions will get you to the Third Flats road with the right forks getting you there quicker. We followed the left forks so we could make the most out of the hike.
Once you make it back to the road you have about 1.7 miles left to the start of the hike. While the road isn't steep it is still almost all uphill going in this direction
