Sterling Overland Trail Museum
Northern Colorado
You should definitely visit this museum, which sports a great collection handed down from the town's founding families. Out the front in the gravel beds…
Must-see attractions in Colorado
Aspen
The access point to the breathtaking Castle Creek Valley is the ghost town of Ashcroft, a silver-mining town founded in 1880. What remains are mostly…
Southern Front Range
This set of Ancestral Puebloan cliff dwellings was carved into the red-rock hills just east of Manitou Springs off Hwy 24. You’ll see the adobe facades…
Colorado
Coors Brewery is now officially called MillerCoors, but try telling the locals that. There’s been brewing on this site since 1873. Coors survived the…
National Center for Atmospheric Research
Boulder
Set near the Flatirons in a Tetris-like structure designed by IM Pei, NCAR is a research facility dedicated to the study of the earth's atmosphere and…
Aspen & the Maroon Bells
Established in 1886, this is where John Henry ‘Doc’ Holliday was allegedly laid to rest in November 1887 (debate about this persists, since some scholars…
Southwest Colorado
The second-largest body of water in Colorado, McPhee Lake is one of the top fishing spots in the San Juan basin. With the best catch ratio in southern…
Colorado
Colorado's newest state park sits on a historic ranch site 40 miles west of Denver. Ranging in elevation from 8100ft to 10,000ft, it has a rich variety of…
Boulder
Tucked into a nondescript university building, CU's natural history museum is far from forgettable. Two floors of multimedia exhibits showcase the…
Southwest Colorado
Twenty-five miles west of Creede and only 0.5 miles from signs on Hwy 149, these impressive falls are visible from an overlook on the fenced edge of a…
Healy House Museum & Dexter Cabin
Central Colorado
Two of Leadville’s oldest surviving homes are decked out with the owners’ original gear, plus period pieces resembling what they may have enjoyed. The…
Central Colorado
South Park City has nothing to do with Cartman, Kyle, Stan or Kenny. It's a collection of 35 original buildings, built in the 1870s and 1880s in places…
Aspen
This art museum's striking building features a warm, lattice-like exterior designed by Pritzker Prize–winner Shigeru Ban and contains three floors of…
Northern Colorado
This 1879 home belonged to Franklin Avery, the city surveyor of Fort Collins. Avery’s foresight is evident in the tree-lined, wide boulevards that grace…
Southwest Colorado
The grassy riverbanks in the Coller State Wildlife Area attract elk, deer and moose in winter. You can see bighorn sheep throughout the year on the south…
Denver
Affording views of downtown Denver and the Rockies, this spacious, hilly patch of green has bike paths, benches and plenty of people-watching. A lyrical…
Southeast Colorado
Still standing proudly on the railway, this historic 1880s structure has been refurbished and reclaimed as a shopping mall and law-office complex of sorts…
Sand Creek Massacre National Historic Site
Southeast Colorado
On November 29, 1864, Colorado Volunteer soldiers attacked an encampment of Cheyenne and Arapaho along Sand Creek. Led by Chief Black Kettle, the Native…
Colorado
South of Denver, just west of Chatfield Reservoir, this pretty canyon has an easy 6.5-mile trail to the Strontia Springs Dam. From there, the Colorado…
Boulder
When you’re this far from the ocean, this is where folks come to suntan, swim and play in the water. There's a big sandy beach, lifeguards and a well…
Boulder
Don't be fooled by the tired lobby with its '80s-era displays: Fiske has one of the hottest projection and sound systems around, making for spectacular…
Crow Canyon Archaeology Center
Southwest Colorado
This cultural center, about 3 miles north of Cortez, offers a day-long educational program that visits an excavation site west of town. Programs teach the…
Southwest Colorado
The fire lookout at Park Point is the highest elevation (8571ft) in the park and offers panoramic views. To the north are the 14,000ft peaks of the San…
Central Colorado
This is where silver magnate and Colorado senator Horace Tabor made and then lost millions in the 1880s, and where his glamorous and sensational wife,…
Colorado
Golden's History Center provides a timeline, albeit zigzagging, of the city's growth and citizens. Rotating exhibits showcase the 15,000 artifacts in the…
Boulder
This trailhead and parking area is just below the summit of Flagstaff Mountain (7283ft) and a short drive from downtown Boulder. The views over Boulder…
Breckenridge
This block-long stretch of historic Breckenridge is where you’ll find a burgeoning arts scene. It has a live-work art space for visiting artists, a…
Northern Colorado
When Prohibition was enacted in 1916, John Holzwarth Sr, a Denver saloonkeeper, started a new life as a subsistence rancher. This site houses several…
Boulder
The MOB history museum offers modern, interactive exhibits on all things Boulder-esque, from prehistoric geology and early Native Americans, to marijuana…
Breckenridge
Here’s a chance to pan for gold, learn how old-mining-town chemists assayed the valuable claims and check out the actual sluices and flumes used in placer…
Denver
This small museum in the heart of the Santa Fe Arts District has innovative exhibits by Latin American and Latino artists. Shows range from rare…
Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art
Boulder
A historic brick house with three galleries of evocative modern art. Mixed-media exhibits can include such whimsy as neon installations and life-sized…
Southwest Colorado
This is a popular short walk from town, or you can drive to the signposted parking lot off Box Canyon Rd. The waterfall is 285ft high and issues thousands…
Central Colorado
If you're a fan of libraries, you'll want to check out this 1862 ranch, which is currently being renovated to accommodate some 32,000 volumes about the…
Aspen & the Maroon Bells
Several of Redstone's original buildings are still standing, including the original chalet-style workers' cottages and John Osgood's personal residence,…
Southwest Colorado
Don't be shy: do a spread eagle for the camera on top of the four corners marker that signifies you're in four states at once. It's a good image, even if…
Vail
Humble but informative, this museum takes you from the invention of skiing to the trials of the 10th Mountain Division, a decorated WWII alpine unit that…
Boulder
There are four indoor exhibit halls and acres of outdoor gardens here. Fluttering with over 1600 butterflies from all the rainforests of the world – not…
Southwest Colorado
This Ancestral Puebloan ruin is the most accessible of the archaeological sites, although the half-mile round-trip access track is still a moderately…
Kirkland Museum of Fine & Decorative Art
Denver
A fascinating museum, Kirkland showcases the beauty of decorative art – furnishings and decor – from every major design period from 1875 to 1990. It's…
