Gold Tourism

121-year-old western Colorado mining flume clings to its secrets Click on the picture above to go to the article directly. Or try this Colorado mining flume clings to its secrets – The Denver Post. Just don’t click on the DP logo at the bottom of the image since that takes you to their overall webpage. […]

Benjamin Stanley Revett was a British-born mining engineer and entrepreneur who made his fortune in the gold-dredging business in Colorado. He was known as the “Gold Dredge King” for his innovative use of dredge boats to scoop up riverbed material in search of gold for the first time in Colorado. He also built a lavish […]

There was recently a broadcast of a short piece about prospecting in metro Denver with long time fellow prospector and friend JJ Long and me. The local TV station, KDVR 31 runs special interest stories about cool things across the state. When they decided to talk about gold prospectors, they reached out to my friend […]

Announcing the latest book in the FInding Gold in Colorado series: The Wandering Prospector. Available now!

The Edwin Carter Museum on the east edge of downtown Breckenridge is a charming little museum housed in the original log cabin of Edwin Carter. Carter was a multitalented guy and was in Breck for its early days. If you are exploring Breck during a visit, this is a fun museum to check out. You’ll […]

4-Wheel drive guide books to the Alpine Loop and the Animas Forks Triangle, in the San Juan Mountains of southwest Colorado.

Link to a YouTube video about the history of the gold rushes in the Breckenridge Colorado area.

5280 Magazine is the premier magazine in metro Denver. I was thrilled to see that when they recently wrote an article on gold panning, they chose to reference this website twice! I’m so happy my efforts to serve the prospecting community are reaching a broader audience. On top of that, our state Governor was inspired […]

We are very excited to announce the next book in the Finding Gold in Colorado collection! Finding Gold in Colorado: Inspiring Images takes you on a photographic journey through Colorado Gold Country. If you enjoy the Prospector’s Edition, you’ll love this new book. It includes hundreds of full color photos, all organized in the same […]

Gold Rushes in Colorado left many old ghost towns, Mills, and mines worth visiting for their history, beauty, and even their gold!

Ever heard of the Iron Springs Divide? How about the Little Snake River? Maybe Lay Creek? These are geographic features in far northwest Colorado and are geographical highlights of a gold bearing region better known for the town of Craig, Dinosaur National Monument, and the Yampa River. The placer gold in this region of the […]

Interested in what it was like to be a prospector before the Colorado Gold Rush? Here’s the journal of the first U.S. person to discover serious gold in Colorado and then mine it. George Andrew Jackson was a big part of making the Pikes Peak Gold Rush of 1859 into a success. By the time […]

Finding Gold in Colorado Book Index: The following index will be included in books published in late 10/2018 and onward. It is provided here for those who own the earlier version of the book in an effort to continue to make the book more useful to all. For those without the book, I hope it […]

To help those planning trips, this simple map shows you which areas of the state are covered in each chapter of the book Finding Gold in Colorado – Prospectors Edition. This image should print fairly well at 8×10 but be sure to set your printer to “best” print quality. Chapters A-R across Colorado, the chapters […]

My book on gold prospecting across Colorado is now available here and ‘in stores everywhere’. It has even been updated for 2024. Awarded recognition as the “#1 New Release” in its category on Amazon in June 2018 and an “Amazon Bestseller” in May 2021 and frequently since! Over 10,000 sold in the first 5 years. […]

The Museum of Northwest Colorado  (http://www.museumnwco.org) recently added a permanent exhibit on the gold prospecting and mining history of that part of our state. This area is not well known for gold since there was no significant gold rush around these parts.  The historical prospectors found gold but the lack of water and small gold […]

The Hidee Mine is one of the easier underground gold mine tours to do since you walk right into a flat, dry tunnel. It’s also very easy to get to from the Denver area. It’s on the Central City Parkway between I-70 and Central City. If you’ve been to Central City to gamble or see […]

Some of my readers here are planning a visit to the Rocky Mountains as part of a family vacation, prospecting adventure or other sojourn. If you are inexperienced with real mountains, you may have some anxieties about coming. Worried about extreme weather, fast moving rivers, dangerous animals, road conditions or screwy locals? Good. You should […]

Most people stop at Vic’s Gold Panning to learn to gold pan. No shock right? But, honestly, there are lots of places to learn to gold pan…although some are less picturesque or less convenient (“Vic’s” is on the way from Denver to Blackhawk/Central City so its an easy stop when you headed up for some […]

A visit to the WMMI will excite and educate anyone with an interest in gold mining in Colorado. Indeed, this museum could almost be called the Colorado Museum of Gold Mining! When I visited, I was thrilled to see their focus on gold mining while also educating on mining and mining history in general. Your […]

The next time you are in the Leadville area, consider walking or biking the Mineral Belt National Recreation Trail to see cool gold rush artifacts and mining sites. My wife and I drove due east from Leadville on 7th Street for a mile or so until we crossed the trail. We parked and walked a […]

Learning about gold placer mining includes everything from panning (which we all do) to sluicing, dredging and, at the large industrial scale, hydraulic mining which is also called hydrauliking. Maybe you’ve seen modern hydraulic mining on TV. The Gold Rush TV show included this technique when the Hoffman team was in South America and late […]

I’m sitting at my computer, looking out the window at yet another winter storm (we’ve had almost 6 feet of snow this month (12/2016) here in Summit County!) and satisfying my gold fever with a little winter reading. I thought you might like to see some of the best of the web regarding Colorado gold. […]

If you are reading this “now”, you missed the grand opening, but the overlook is open 24/7/365. Call the Victor Lowell Thomas Museum about scheduled tours of the whole historic mining area. The tours are organized through the museum in Victor; learn more here. …to read more about this site and the area, check out […]

The Lomax Placer site gives you a chance to see and touch placer hydrauliking equipment at a site where it was actually used. You can also see a fully equipped gold assay office, small museum and learn to gold pan. As you drive up Gold Run Road from Highway 9 (just southwest of the gondola […]

Newmont North America runs the huge open pit Cresson gold mine near Cripple Creek, a small town in the Colorado Rockies. The folks running the largest gold mine in Colorado today have done a lot to support the local community from sponsoring local sports leagues to donating the gold to cover the state capital dome. […]

If you make it to Denver, this is a must stop! The Hall of minerals has lots of gorgeous crystals, mineral samples and lots of gold, especially Colorado gold. Here’s the entry area on the ground floor of the museum: They are even encouraging everyone to “be a prospector”!! Here’s a preview of the gold […]

A while back, I had a friend from China and her husband come visit. They wanted to spend a day as gold prospectors, so we visited Arapahoe Bar to dig (see my post about that site here). We dug the bottom of an existing hole and did very well, so they got to take home […]