On the westernmost shore of the great American plain, the city of Denver sits like a sentry, guarding the central Rocky Mountain region like an old military fort, offering westward travelers one final opportunity to replenish their supplies before spiriting off into the hills for one adventure or another. At least, that is what this capital city feels like: a community that exists in the midpoint between two worlds.
One of these worlds is long and flat and stretches eastward for a thousand miles: The Great Plains. The other is a 200-mile-wide (on average) belt of sky-scraping mountaintops and epic glacial valleys. The latter of the two is the Rocky Mountains, and Denver is the perfect place to stage an expedition into their very heart.
1858: Gold in Them Thar Hills
Because the Colorado Territory did not exist until 1861, the area that is now known as Denver, Boulder, and Fort Collins (Colorado’s population center, “The Front Range”) originally belonged to the sprawling Territory of Kansas. As such it was sparsely populated, with only a handful of small settlements that were little more than supply stops on the route to the Pacific coast.
Then, in 1858, a small but significant amount of gold was found not far form current day Denver. It was followed by a string of other notable discoveries elsewhere in the state, and by 1859, the Gold Rush was effectively in full swing. “Denver City” was officially established at the tail end of 1858.
At first, the small city of Denver was home to only prospectors who tried their luck panning in the nearby creeks. It was not long, however, before Colorado’s Gold Rush saw people moving westward in droves, hoping to strike it rich in the mountains. Denver began to grow rapidly, and though it experienced a few turbulent years there at the beginning, it was all-poised to become to eventual capital of the future State of Colorado.
A Rocky Mountain Gateway
Anyone who is looking to visit the central Rocky Mountains would do well to start with the city of Denver. With its position at the intersection of Interstate 25 and Interstate 70, Denver is an ideally located hub for would-be mountaineers, offering quick access to 14,000 foot peaks, world-class skiing and snowboarding, and some of the finest solitude that you can get.
With Denver as a starting point, it is possible to reach a huge number of the state’s famous “14er’s” within a short few hours, leaving more than enough time to make it to the summit on the very same day.
The iconic Rocky Mountain National Park is a short drive from the capital, and in fact, one of the most popular day trips in the state is a loop drive starting in Denver, traveling through Rocky Mountain National Park, and crossing through Arapahoe and Roosevelt National Forests on the way back to the city.
The “Ancestral Rockies”
From the office window of any downtown-Denver office building, it is possible to see across the short ten miles to Red Rocks Park, one of the most stunning examples of what geologists refer to as the “Ancestral Rockies”.
These massive, brilliantly colored rock formations are shaped in such a way that makes you think that they must have burst out of the ground in some sudden tectonic fit. In actuality, these red behemoths are actually the remnants of the ancient mud floor that existed before the Rocky Mountains even came to be.
And by “ancient”, we mean ancient: one popular walking trail through the park allows visitors to visit the preserved footprints of the state’s official dinosaur, the Stegosaurus, and stand on stone that is older than the Rockies themselves.
