Celebrate Colorado’s Public Lands with Unmatched Outdoor Pursuits and Meaningful Voluntourism Opportunities

Denver, Feb. 28, 2018 --

There are a variety of ways to get involved in celebrating Colorado’s outdoors for everyone to enjoy. For more information, visit https://www.colorado.com/articles/care-colorado-voluntourism-opportunities.

Give Back With Voluntourism Opportunities:

Colorado Public Lands Day (May 19, 2018). Colorado was the first state in the nation to designate a state holiday celebrating public lands to encourage all Coloradans and visitors to the state to get outside and enjoy Colorado’s unparalleled public lands.

Colorado Fourteeners Initiative (Golden). In an effort to preserve and protect the natural integrity of the state’s fourteeners, the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative offers visitors volunteer opportunities on maintenance projects.

Trails 2000 (Durango). Trails 2000 builds and maintains Durango’s more than 300 miles of trails. Trail season offerings available to visitors include volunteering at maintenance projects, helping remove deadfall and more.

Vail Nature Center (Vail). The Vail Nature Center hosts a weekly outdoor volunteer project including invasive species removal, planting native vegetation, trail restoration and more.

Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (Denver). Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC) has been motivating thousands of people annually to provide volunteer work for their outdoor stewardships projects.

Unique Ways to Experience Colorado's Public Lands:

Experience a canyoneering adventure in the Uncompahgre National Forest.  Canyoning Colorado offers canyoning/canyoneering descents and trainings in the Uncompahgre National Forest outside of Ouray. The tours and trainings are available to climbers of all levels.

Catch a glimpse of wildlife on the Colorado Birding Trail. The Colorado Birding Trail is comprised of outdoor recreation sites, hiking or walking paths, both public and private, along a designated driving route across the state.

Cool off in the brisk water at Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve. Medano Creek in Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve emerges in early summer for visitors to wade into it to cool hot feet after tromping around the dunes, build sandcastles, boogie board and splash around in the waves.

Marvel at the masonry of Colorado’s ancient people at Canyons of the Ancients National Monument.  Ancestral Puebloans structures still stand more than 700 years later in Canyons of the Ancients National Monument. Those who tour the area’s mesas and canyons today are left to speculate about the purpose of the multistory brick towers.

New Tech Toolkits from Colorado Parks & Wildlife: Colorado Parks & Wildlife has launched a fishing App for smart phones that enables anglers to check out mapping information for over 2,000 locations in the state, along with the most up-to-date regulations, details on fish species, seasonal flies, weather and more.

Raft the tumbling rapids of the Cache la Poudre River. Colorado’s only nationally designated Wild and Scenic River, the Cache la Poudre carves down Poudre Canyon west of Fort Collins. Rafting outfitters guide groups to rapids of all difficulty levels

Walk in dinosaur footprints in Comanche National Grassland. The Picketwire Canyon was home to a lake during the Jurassic period, and a brontosaurus used to frolic along its shores. The footprints are reached after a flat five-mile hike, bike or horse ride. Stop at the Comanche National Grassland Office in La Junta for directions to the tracks.

Public Land Community Initiatives:

Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks 50^th Anniversary. City staff celebrated the institution of the Open Space tax last November but events will continue throughout the year. Boulder is located where the mountains meet the plains and it allows for both mountain and plains recreation.

Palisade Plunge (Grand Valley). Slated to begin construction in 2019 in the Grand Valley’s east end as part of Governor John Hickenlooper’s Colorado the Beautiful Initiative, the Palisade Plunge Trail will allow visitors to mountain bike down a 32-mile trail that starts atop Grand Mesa.

Trail Maintenance Endowment Fund (Steamboat Springs). Resident riders and trail-focused guests to Steamboat Springs continue to benefit from new trails created using public funding from initiative 2A. As a result, the Trail Maintenance Endowment Fund determines trail maintenance priorities annually, and land managers use funds to fuel projects.

Whitewater Park (Buena Vista). A brother and sister, who donated land to the city of Buena Vista as permanent public parkland, saved the property that now holds Whitewater Park from development. The park now draws recreational boaters and professional whitewater athletes from around the country.

Kirstin Koszorus
Colorado Tourism Office
Phone: (303) 892-3871
E-Mail: [email protected]