Entry No. 19 — the Colorado Springs file — filed under: outdoor
Rita the Rock Planter
“she crouches in the hills patching holes in the scarred earth”
A 21-foot troll built entirely from recycled wood by Danish artist Thomas Dambo, hidden up a short trail near the old mining town of Victor — she crouches in the hills patching holes in the scarred earth, a quarter-mile walk and a world away from the tourist trail.
The story
In August 2023, Danish recycle artist Thomas Dambo and a crew of over 100 local volunteers spent 12 days piecing together thousands of scraps of salvaged pallet wood at nearly 10,000 feet elevation. The result is Rita the Rock Planter, a 21-foot-tall wooden troll crouching on the exposed soil of Little Grouse Mountain just outside the old mining town of Victor. Unlike traditional public art tucked into manicured city parks, Rita sits out on an unsheltered ridge framed by open sky, mountain scrub, and historical mine shafts.
Dambo designed Rita's storyline around the industrial trauma of Victor's 19th-century Gold Rush. According to the backstory created for the installation, Rita fell asleep for 'a hundred suns' and woke up to find the hillsides pockmarked with open holes left by prospectors hunting for shiny ore. Fearing that animals or wandering humans would fall in, she knelt down on the mountain and began covering the holes with massive rocks. Look at her hands—she is physically holding a boulder right over a historic prospect pit, turning salvaged timber into a quiet commentary on ecological repair.
What makes Rita compelling isn't just her massive scale, but how completely her weathered palette blends into the terrain. Constructed entirely from recycled lumber, her raw wooden skin matches the dry dirt, pale rock, and mine tailings surrounding her. She is Dambo's second Colorado troll after Isak Heartstone in Breckenridge, but her perch above a high-altitude mining district gives her a starker, far more isolated atmosphere.
What it's like
Arriving near 10,000 feet, you'll feel the thin mountain air before you even set foot on the dirt. You have three main ways to reach her: park at the upper lot off Overlook Road for a brief 0.2-mile downhill walk, pull into the lower dirt lot off Highway 67 for a steeper 0.8-mile uphill trail, or hike directly from Victor's town center by following the trail markers—a line of colorful wooden birdhouses Dambo mounted near Wallace Park. There is no shade on the ridge, leaving you fully exposed to high-altitude sun and sudden wind drops. To dodge the midday tour groups drifting over from Cripple Creek, target a late afternoon visit when the golden light hits her timber frame against the distant Sangre de Cristo mountains.
The move: Drive the gold-mining backroads to Victor, take the quarter-mile Little Grouse Mountain trail to find Rita, and pack a picnic to make a half-day of the ghost-town detour.
📍 Before you go Rita sits on the Little Grouse Mountain Trail just west of Victor. There are two ways in: park at the lower dirt lot off Highway 67 (about a mile west of town) for the longer uphill climb, or drive Overlook Road to the upper lot for a much shorter walk. Easier still, leave the car in town near Wallace Park and the visitor center and simply follow the colorful birdhouses Dambo planted as trail markers. You're near 10,000 feet here, so bring layers and water and expect to be winded. The road and trail aren't maintained in winter — late spring through fall is your window. Cripple Creek's casinos and old depot sit minutes down the road.
- 📍 Victor
- 💸 Free
- ⚡ Up for anything
- 🌗 Outdoors
Where: Little Grouse Mountain Trail, Victor, CO 80860
Hours: Free, open to the public; ~0.25mi rocky walk on Little Grouse Mountain Trail. Remote — combine with a Victor/Cripple Creek day trip.
Pair it with
- Cripple Creek Wild Donkey Herd — Just minutes down the road in Cripple Creek, these free-roaming feral burros are direct descendants of the 19th-century mining pack animals whose scarred land Rita is mending.
- Horsethief Falls Trail — Located off Highway 67 on your drive toward Victor, this shaded forest trail takes you past a historic railroad tunnel and down to a mountain waterfall.
- Green Mountain Falls Skyspace — Pair Dambo's raw recycled woodwork with another high-elevation art destination—James Turrell's open-sky light chamber set above nearby Green Mountain Falls.
Good to know
How much does it cost to see Rita the Rock Planter?
Visiting Rita is completely free and open to the public year-round, though the access roads and trails are not maintained or plowed during winter.
How long is the walk to reach the troll?
It depends on where you park: it's roughly a quarter-mile walk from the main trail access, a short 0.2-mile downhill stroll from the upper Overlook Road lot, or a 0.8-mile uphill hike from the lower Highway 67 lot.
What is Rita made of?
She was built out of 100% recycled scrap wood and salvaged pallets assembled over 12 days by Thomas Dambo and more than 100 community volunteers.
What should I bring for the visit?
Because she sits on an exposed ridge at nearly 10,000 feet elevation, bring plenty of water, sunscreen, and warm extra layers to deal with high winds and quick weather shifts.
Plan a visit & invite your people →
Further reading: visitcos.com · Roadside America · Atlas Obscura · Yelp · cbsnews.com · rmpbs.org
last checked: 2026-06-04