20 Attractions to Explore Near Squaw Mountain

Squaw Pass Road (now Mestaa’Ėhehe Pass) is a beautiful, scenic high mountain pass that travels through Clear Creek County in Colorado. The road is at an elevation of 2,984 meters and it winds its way through the mountains, offering stunning views of the surrounding area. The road is also popular for its many switchbacks and hairpin turns, which make for an exciting drive.

Chief Mountain Trail is a 3.1 mile moderately trafficked out and back trail located near Idaho Springs, Colorado that features beautiful wild flowers and is good for all skill levels. The trail offers a number of activity options and is best used from June until November. Dogs are also able to use this trail but must be kept on leash.

Echo Mountain is a ski, snowboard and tubing area located in Clear Creek County, west of Evergreen, Colorado. It is the closest ski area to the Denver metro area.The main lift, the Hot Laps Special, is a fixed-grip triple that has a turn around time of 4 minutes 39 seconds. The entire mountain is wired for sound so music can also be played. The two lodge buildings are of modern industrial design featuring many windows overlooking the slopes, corrugated metal walls and exposed ceilings.

The Denver Mountain Parks system contains more than 14,000 acres of parklands in the mountains and foothills of Jefferson, Clear Creek, Douglas, and Grand counties in Colorado, west and south of Denver. It currently consists of 22 developed parks and other undeveloped parklands that serve as open space, scenic viewsheds, and wildlife habitat. Its properties encompass a variety of habitats, including prairie, mountain meadow, riparian forests, montane and subalpine forests, and alpine tundra

Juniper Pass is a high mountain pass at an elevation of 3.368m (11,049ft) above the sea level, located in Clear Creek County. The road to the summit is totally paved. It’s called Colorado State Highway 103, aka Squaw Pass Road. The harrowing highway has steep drop-offs on both sides.

This largest water wheel in the state of Colorado, was constructed in 1893 by Charlie Tayler. Tayler used this water wheel to power an ore processing stamp mill at his gold mining operations on Ute Creek. It was moved to its present site in 1946, a gift to the people of Idaho Springs by his estate. It was restored during the spring and summer of 1988 by volunteers and private contributions. It was dedicated during Gold Rush Days, July 16-17, 1988.

The Mount Evans Scenic Byway, just 60 miles west of Denver, is the highest paved road in North America. A day trip to the top is a journey that snakes and climbs through nearly 9,000 feet of elevation gain, from the high plains of Denver through five climate zones to the 14,264-foot summit of Mount Evans, one of 54 peaks in Colorado that soar to 14,000 feet and above – the famous “fourteeners.”

Argo Gold Mine & Mill is a national historic site located about 45 minutes from Denver. featuring an intact gold mill built at the entrance of the Argo Tunnel. The tunnel was built between 1893 and 1910 to drain the gold mines in Virginia Canyon, Gilpin Gulch, Russell Gulch, Quartz Hill, Nevadaville, and Central City and allow easier ore removal. It began in 1893 with the construction of the Argo Tunnel. After 17 years it reached Central City, about 4.5 miles away.

Mount Goliath is a peak high on the shoulders of Mount Evans located outside of Idaho Springs within the Arapaho National Forest. Here in this fragile alpine environment Denver Botanic Gardens oversees the highest cultivated garden in the U.S., managed in conjunction with the U.S. Forest Service. Amid grand mountain vistas, the 1.5 mile Pesman Trail winds through subalpine and alpine areas of bristlecone pines and wildflowers.

The Mt Goliath Natural Area is located 16.5 miles south of Idaho Springs on the Mt Evans Scenic Byway. It protects the largest, northernmost stand of Bristlecone Pine trees in North America, and is internationally recognized as one of the purest locations to study alpine ecology.While bristlecone pines highlight this area, it also supports localized micro-climates with plants found nowhere else below the Arctic Circle.

Echo Lake Park is a park located along the Mount Evans Scenic Byway about 33.5 mi west of Denver, Colorado. The park provides a stone shelter with picnic tables and barbecue grills on one end of the lake, and the 1926 Echo Lake Lodge and an Arapaho National Forest campground are found at the other. Access to backpacking trails, including the Chicago Lakes trail and Lincoln Lakes trail, can be found adjacent to the lake. The park is part of the Denver Mountain Parks system.

The Phoenix Gold Mine is an authentic trip into Colorado mining history. This is a working gold and silver mine owned and operated by third-generation hard-rock miner Alvin "Al" Mosch. As we found out, the mine's temperature hovers between 42 and 54 degrees F. year round, so it's good to wear a jacket no matter what month you arrive. Miners still push tons of gold and silver ore along the narrow-gauge rails in small underground ore cars, just as they did 150 years ago.

Lincoln Lake is a 98 acre lake located in Washburn County. It has a maximum depth of 27 feet. Visitors have access to the lake from a public boat landing. It makes a great spot for a hike. The trails are well marked. With the lake as a backdrop and beautiful rock outcroppings and so more.

Elk Meadow Park is a park and trail system, which is home to a number of outdoor activities. In the summertime, the many miles of trail serve as a place to run, walk, jog, mountain bike, and simply enjoy Mother Nature. Most of the park is open meadows with grasses and wildflowers for the residents of Jefferson County to see and enjoy.

The historic City of Black Hawk is a home rule municipality located in Gilpin County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 127 at the 2020 United States Census, making Black Hawk the least populous city  in Colorado. The tiny city is a historic mining settlement founded in 1859 during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush. Black Hawk is now a part of the Denver-Aurora-Lakewood, CO Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Front Range Urban Corridor.

Teller House is a historic hotel in Central City, Colorado. Built in 1872, the building now serves as a restaurant.The bar at the Teller House is well known for the "Face on the Barroom Floor," a painting of a woman's face on the wooden floor, done in 1936 by local artist Herndon Davis, as a joke after being fired by the Teller House.

Evergreen Mountain lies in the southwest corner of the 1,128 acre Alderfer/Three Sisters Park, part of the Jefferson County Open Space. Accessible via an approximately 6-mile round-trip hike on excellent, well-signed trails and requiring about 1,100 feet of elevation gain, the Evergreen Mountain summit is attainable to a wide-spectrum of hikers.

This is the fifth oldest professional opera company in the country and is renowned for exquisite world-class productions, a robust young artist training program, creative education activities and community engagement. It has offered operatic and theatrical productions that drew prominent actors and performers in the late 19th-century, and in the early 20th-century it was a motion picture theatre.

The Chicago Lakes are located south of Idaho Springs in the Mt Evans Wilderness Area. These spectacular alpine lakes lie .65 miles and 313' apart in a broad valley beneath Mt Evans, Mt Spalding and Mount Warren. Visitors will enjoy stunning alpine scenery and wildlife that includes moose, elk, bighorn sheep and mountain goat.