Weird day trips from Boulder
The strangest Boulder finds are often a short drive out. These 10 day trips — Estes Park Memorial Observatory Open House, Trail Ridge Road Night Sky Tour (Estes Park Adventure Tours), Jackson Lake State Park Dark Sky Stargazing and more — are each hand-vetted and sourced: ghost towns, hot-spring soaks, roadside oddities, and odd small-town museums worth the gas. A weird day trip is its own kind of date.
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Estes Park Memorial Observatory Open House
Just north of the high school near the shore of Lake Estes, this small observatory pairs its monthly open hou…
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Trail Ridge Road Night Sky Tour (Estes Park Adventure Tours)
This guided tour drives you up Trail Ridge Road past 11,000 feet to several pullouts along the Continental Di…
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Jackson Lake State Park Dark Sky Stargazing
This was Colorado's first state park to earn International Dark Sky Park status, and out on the eastern plain…
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OSMP Full Moon Night Hikes
The City of Boulder's Open Space and Mountain Parks and Boulder County both run rotating series of naturalist…
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Holiday Twin Drive-In
One of Colorado's handful of surviving traditional drive-ins, the Holiday Twin runs two screens, each showing…
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Santiago Mine
Perched at over 12,000 feet in the Waldorf Basin, the Santiago Mine and Mill is a remarkably preserved 1930s…
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The Jessie Mine and Mill
Active from the late 1880s to the early 1900s, the Jessie Mine and Mill was once one of the largest gold, sil…
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7:30 Mine
The 7:30 Mine was one of the premier silver producers in the Silver Plume area during the Colorado Silver Boo…
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Sallie Barber Mine
Perched high in the Golden Horseshoe mining district near Breckenridge, the Sallie Barber Mine is a historic…
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The Birch Ruins
Perched on a 75-foot rock outcropping overlooking downtown Estes Park, these are the stone remnants of Albert…