Camping Adventures in Cripple Creek, Colorado

[riversmommie]

Camping near the Lost Burro Campground close to Cripple Creek, Colorado. We hiked the Florissant Fossil Beds National Park to see Colorado's 30 million year old redwood forest and the Hornbeck Homestead. Then we checked out the Mollie Kathleen Gold Mine Tour which took us 1,000 feet below the earth's surface. And I might have gambled a little bit in downtown Cripple Creek;) Enjoy!

[accadacca]

Nice.

[uintahiker]

Lots of cool things to do in the area. When I was there a year ago I thought that the business district of Cripple Creek had sold out. It looks cool from the street, but you look closer and it's all casinos. It's kindof like Deadwood South Dakota. It would be much more cool if there were little shops, restaurants, etc.

[jman]

Hey what do you know, a non-Utah TR!
Looks like a fun adventure. Thanks for sharing.

[Sombeech]

[riversmommie]

It did appear that the smaller, historic casinos were selling out to larger corporate casinos which did take away from the historic downtown feel. We found a great oldskool casino called Johnny Nolans that still had the same antiquish appearance and ambiance with a great little cafe upstairs. Their little casino downstairs still uses tokens, which is awesome because I love the clink-clink sound of winning! We loved the mine tour at the Mollie Kathleen and enjoyed hiking around Florissant National Monument. I agree though, there needs to be more cute little cafes and such along the main street; it looks like there is a lot of construction going on inside several buildings so maybe they are planning something like that for this summer.

[uintahiker]

Definitely a fun area though. Have you been out to the paint mines east of Colorado Springs? It's another spot that's definitely worth a visit.

[ststephen]

The petrified trees look very cool!

[riversmommie]

Special thanks to Unitahiker!! The Indian Paint Mines were sooo much fun! Such a great little secret playground:))