Sights in Colorado
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University of Colorado at Boulder
It is possible for prospective students and curious visitors to tour one of the finest public universities in America, and one of the best schools overall. It's a beautiful campus set above downtown, on what is known as the Hill. Free tours begin with a one-hour informational session followed by a 90-minute walking tour.
As you stroll, remember you are moving in the footsteps of notable alumni such as astronaut Scott Carpenter (one of 17 astronauts with CU diplomas), Apple's Steve Wozniak, Sidney Altman (one of six Nobel Laureates), Robert Redford (didn't graduate), South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone (smoked a ton of dope, did graduate), actor Jonah Hill (stop…
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Dancers
Frozen in joyful two-step, Jonathan Borofsky's whimsical 'Dancers' invite rushing traffic to stop and play. The centerpiece of Sculpture Park, they supervise live music and lounging picnickers in summer and rise eerily from the snow in winter. Initially a controversial buy for conservative citizens, they're a symbol on scale with Denver's ambition to be the cultural capital of the West.
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US Air Force Academy
One of the third-highest profile US military universities in the country, this is something like the Ivy Leage meets basic training, where the students are soldiers, all have killer academic and extra-curricular backgrounds and work full-time while going to school. It can be a surreal place, but it's well worth visiting, especially if fighters are rocketing into the sky from the airfield.
Did we mention they have a decent football team and are nestled on their own base-campus tucked high on a plateau at the base of the pine draped red earth Rockies?
Set 14 miles north of Colorado Springs, you can access the base from the north (exit 156) or south (exit 150) gate. Most vis…
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Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center
This recently re-done $28-million art museum and 400-seat theatre opened in the 1936. The museum's collection is surprisingly sophisticated with some terrific Latin American art and photography, and a great series, in the original, pebbled marble wing, by local artist Eric Bransby on the history of navigation. But these are just some of the 23,000 pieces in its permanent collection
There are Mexican clay figures, Native American basketry and quilts, wood-cut prints from social justice artist Leopoldo Mendez, terrific abstract work from local artists such as Vance Kirkland and Floyd Tunson. Its biggest and most famous work is Richard Diebenkorn's Urbana No. 4, an abstract …
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Edwin Carter Museum
An award-winning museum that sheds light on a pioneer lured west by the Pike's Peak Gold Rush in 1858-9. He reached the blue river valley in 1860. An original environmentalist he noticed the impact of mining on wildlife early on, documenting genetic deformities (such as two-headed animals) he suspected were linked to leaching toxins.
He must have seen the handwriting on the wall because he became a taxidermist to preserve the wildlife he encountered in the area. At its height he had a collection of 3000 pieces, and displayed them in his house, which is now a museum. The 12ft ceilings, an anomaly in his day, were there to display his collection. What you'll see here is the…
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Garden of the Gods
A compound of 13 bouldered peaks and soaring red rock pinnacles accessed by a network of concrete paths and trails. From the main parking area you'll see the Kissing Camels, White Rock and Tower of Babel right away. The Cathedral Towers and Sleeping Giant are further on.
It's a great place for families, as little ones love rambling the paths, while lovers snuggle or quarrel in shadows, and resident deer prance among the brush. This land was originally purchased in 1879 by Charles Elliot Perkins. He'd always wanted to make it an official public park and his kids carried out his wishes after his death. It became a park in 1909.
To be clear, this is not a wilderness experien…
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Ashcroft
- Aspen, USA
- Sights › Ghost town
The best access point to the 20 miles of groomed trails in the stunning Castle Creek Valley is the ghost town of Ashcroft, a silver-mining town founded in 1880. What remains are mostly miners cottages (log cabins with tin roofs), a couple of broken-down wagons stranded in the waist-high grass, and a post office and saloon.
At its height 2500 people worked here, but in 1893 the silver market crashed and the town's population plummeted to 100 residents within two hours.
There's a fine picnic area down by the creek, and a series of displays profiling famous residents, and local transportation and communication of the day. Preserved by the Aspen Historical Society, it's well …
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Aspen Center for Environmental Studies
The Aspen Center for Environmental Studies (ACES) is a 22-acre (10-hectare) wildlife sanctuary that hugs the Roaring Fork River. With a mission to advance 'the ethic that the earth must be respected and nurtured,' the Center's naturalists provide summertime guided walks, eagle demonstrations and special programs for youngsters at the top of Aspen Mountain and mid-mountain on Snowmass.
Guided walks on Snowmass depart daily at 10am. In the winter, snowshoe and ski tours are available in various locations, and its weekly slide shows may give you some respite from the frigid outdoors. You can take a self-guided tour of the preserve (with snowshoes in winter, if you prefer) su…
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Rio Grande Park
Aspen's biggest public park runs along the river, and is bisected by the Rio Grande Trail for 2.1 miles. The park is home to an enticing skate park, outdoor basketball courts, a huge athletic field perfect for football or frisbee, an art museum and sculpture garden, and the John Denver Sanctuary.
Set in a grassy riverside meadow and punctuated by boulders that form a natural amphitheater, the sanctuary is a popular sunbathing spot. Some of the stones are engraved with Denver's lyrics including 'Rocky Mountain High.' This peaceful place, with the mountains looming beyond, may even tempt your snarky, protopunk brain to reevaluate the late artist's musical impact. Or not.
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Balcony House
Tickets are required for the one-hour guided tours of Balcony House, on the east side of the Cliff Palace Loop. A visit is quite an adventure and will challenge anyone's fear of heights or small places. You'll be rewarded with outstanding views of Soda Canyon, 600ft below the sandstone overhang that once served as the ceiling for 35 to 40 rooms.
The Balcony House tour requires you to descend a 100 ft-long staircase into the canyon, then climb a 32 ft-tall ladder, crawl through a 12 ft-long tunnel and climb an additional 60 ft of ladders and stone steps to get out. It's the most challenging tour in the park but might just be the most rewarding, not to mention fun!
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Manitou Cliff Dwellings
A set of stunning Anasazi cliff dwellings grooved into the red-rock hills at 6530ft just east of Manitou Springs off Hwy 24. You'll see the adobe facades, and get a feel for the cool cave interiors with their grain-storage turrets and beamed ceilings in what is a string of half-a-dozen multiple family homes. Talk about an efficient use of space!
There's also a museum gift shop and snacks on site in a groovy Pueblo-style structure that looms from the hills. The museum has a terrific pottery display downstairs and interesting video displays thrughout, including inside the bathroom! It's not exactly Mesa Verde, but it'll do if you can't make it to the Four Corners.
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Will Rogers Shrine of the Sun
Set behind the zoo and those massive crenelated stone gates, on a cliff about two-thirds of the way up Cheyenne, is this tower named for Spencer Penrose's good friend Will Rogers, who died in a plane crash coincidentally around the time of its construction. There are busts of both men out front and the best Colorado Springs views in town.
Plaques on the outer wall are oriented and labeled to landmarks below. You'll see the Broadmoor, Fort Carson, Cheyenne Lake and the Garden of the Gods peeking above the trees. There are black-and-white photos of Rogers in the tower's rooms off the narrow cylindrical stairwell. We like the one with Ty Cobb.
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US Olympic Training Center
Fans of Olympic sports will enjoy a free guided spin through one of three official United States Olympic training centers. This is, or has been, the chief training facility for most winter sports, and summer sports such as cycling, weight lifting and volleyball. It begins with an inspirational up-to-date highlight reel.
Afterward you'll stroll through the 37-acre campus, glimpse weight rooms and gyms, and hear legends of athletes past. The tour ends at the US Olympic Hall of Fame in the lobby. Recent inductees include the spectacular sprinter Michael Johnson, volleyballer Karch Kiraly and the great marksman Lones Wigger.
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Cliff Palace
The only way to see the superb Cliff Palace is to take the hour-long ranger-led tour. The tour retraces the steps taken by the Ancestral Puebloans – visitors must climb down a stone stairway and four 10 ft ladders. This grand representative of engineering achievement, with 217 rooms and 23 kivas, provided shelter for 250 or 300 people.
Its inhabitants were without running water. However, springs across the canyon, below Sun Temple, were most likely their primary water sources. The use of small 'chinking' stones between the large blocks is strikingly similar to Ancestral Puebloan construction at distant Chaco Canyon.
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Colorado State Capitol
Sitting commandingly atop Capitol Hill, this stately neoclassical government building looks out across the grand Civic Center Park region. The ornate interior befits such a grand building, and visitors can join free tours that depart every 45 minutes.
Construction began in the 1890s from locally quarried rose onyx (Beulah red marble) and in 1908, to celebrate the Colorado gold rush, the superb dome was covered in 200 ounces of gold leaf. In 1909 the 15th step on the western entrance was designated one mile above sea level. Subsequent measures inscribed this marker at the 17th step in 1969, and the 13th in 2003.
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Cheyenne Mountain Zoo
Layered high up on Cheyenne Mountain, the largest private zoo in the country was launched with holdovers from Penrose's private animal collection. These days it takes conservation more seriously and is proud of its giraffe breeding program. The habitats are decent with instructional elements built in. There are some nice play areas for kids.
And the cast of characters (gorillas, Komodo dragons, orangutans, tigers, Siberian snow leopard, hippos and elephants) will keep you interested. The Mountaineer Sky Ride, a brief chairlift experience, will give you a bird's-eye view of the whole zoo.
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Pikes Peak
At 14,110ft, Pikes Peak may not be one of the tallest of Colorado's 54 14-ers, but it's certainly the most famous. Maybe because it's the only one with a road and a train to the top? That's where you'll find an observation platform and a kitschy gift shop in the Summit House selling Pikes Peak sweaters and hackeysacks, and homemade fudge is for sale in the cafeteria.
Down slope are seven reservoirs - Pikes Peak is the water source for this entire region, and from the summit you can see Kansas, the Oklahoma panhandle, the Wyoming Continental Divide and the Spanish Peaks in New Mexico.
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Denver Public Library
Hardly a dusty bibliotheca, the Denver Public Library is an active and hip place. In addition to its voluminous stacks, the library lends CDs and DVDs from its extensive archive, and it streams music from its website. There's a schedule of lectures, and self-help and skills courses. Shifting exhibits feature local historical and contemporary photography.
Book a meeting room or join one of the community-learning sessions. On the 5th floor is the Western History & Genealogy Deptartment and affiliate campuses include the Blair-Caldwell African American Research Library.
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Chautauqua Park
This historic landmark park is not just the gateway to Boulder's most magnificent slab of open space (we're talking about the Flatirons) it also has a wide, lush lawn that attracts picnicking families, sunbathers, frisbee folk, and – gasp – even studious students from CU down the road. It also gets copious hikers, climbers and trail runners.
This was once an important site for the inspired rural educational organization, the Chautauqua movement. These days, it's a park, a lodge and an auditorium where world-class musicians perform each summer.
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Denver Art Museum
The DAM is home to one of the largest Native American art collections in the USA, and puts on special avant-garde multimedia exhibits. The Western American Art section of the permanent collection is justifiably famous.
The $110-million Frederic C Hamilton wing, designed by Daniel Libeskind, is a strange, angular, fan-like edifice. It's inspired and mesmerizing. If you think the place looks weird from the outside, look inside: here shapes shift with each turn thanks to a combination of design and uncanny natural-light tricks.
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Naropa University
Founded by Tibetan Buddhist master Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche who escaped Tibet and climbed over the Himalayas into India as a young man. In 1970, at just 30, he began presenting teachings in the US and founded the Naropa Institute (which became Naropa University) in 1974. It offers a contemplative education in psychology, environmental studies, music, performing arts and more.
Naropa is also home to the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, co-founded by his fellow Beat Allen Ginsberg, and poet Anne Waldman.
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Independence
- Aspen, USA
- Sights › Ghost town
Just 16 miles from Aspen at the foot of Independence Pass, this gold-mining boom town turned ghost town started as a tented camp in the summer of 1879, when one lucky miner struck gold on the Fourth of July. Operated and preserved by the Aspen Historical Society, you can see the remains of the old livery, the general store and a miners cabin or three.
After its population had peaked at 1500 residents, the town fell away during the harsh winter storm of 1899 after supply routes were severed due to severe snowfall.
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Central Park
Spanning from the northern edge of downtown to the Contemporary Art Museum at 13th Street, and encompassing the public library, a twice-weekly seasonal farmers market, and a large swatch of the Boulder Creek bike trail, it's hard to avoid this park. And really, why would you want to? It's a nice spot for a picnic and a nap.
Here is a long blade of lush lawn, ample shade and sun and a ramp leading to the Boulder Creek trail and the creek itself.
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Colorado Ski Museum
This humble but surprisingly informative museum takes you from the invention of skiing in the Norwegian military in 1767 to the Colorado ski pioneers who, in 1887, rode 10ft to 14ft wood-skis they made themselves. You can see these vintage skis and boots (and snowboards for that matter) among the well-curated exhibits.
There's a room dedicated to the Tenth Mountain Division, a high alpine WWII unit who trained in these mountains, as well as the fledgling Colorado Ski and Snowboard Hall of Fame.
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Confluence Park
This wonderful place of healthy outdoors activity is a magnet for families with picnic blankets and prepared lunches, smooching young lovers and singles buried in a book or newspaper. Cool off on a hot summer's day by swimming or wading over the rocks.
Confluence Park is where the Cherry Creek and Platte River meet, and bike/jogging trails connect it to all the other waterfront parks. It's a wonderfully egalitarian place where all types from all backgrounds come to celebrate their city.
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