Best Summer Activity on a Ski Slope 2015 | High Mountain Ropes Challenge Course at Adventure Ridge | Best of Denver® | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Denver | Westword
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Best Summer Activity on a Ski Slope

High Mountain Ropes Challenge Course at Adventure Ridge

As the snow melts, Vail's Adventure Ridge swaps out tubing, ski biking and a kids' snowmobile course for zipline tours, a climbing wall, a primo disc-golf course and other activities. The best of these is a pair of ropes challenge courses. You'll start with a ground-school lesson to make sure you know how to operate the can't-fall, can't-fail harness system, then spend thirty minutes up in the air on the North Course or sixty minutes on the more challenging South Course, quivering in that harness as you attempt to traverse a series of increasingly difficult obstacles. Don't sweat it when some adventurous little girl shows you up. Happens all the time.

Best Colorado Landmark You Can Climb

The Flatirons

With their name and image plastered on everything from T-shirts to car dealerships to street signs, it's easy to forget that the Flatirons are more than just a cool logo. But they're definitely real: majestic slabs of sandstone, punching up a thousand feet or more out of the ground just a scant few miles from Boulder's Pearl Street Mall. The best way to properly appreciate them is to rope up and scale one of the formation's many moderate lines, like the Direct Route on the First Flatiron. Climbing the Flatirons is far from a wilderness experience: The parking lot at Chautauqua Park is packed with dog walkers and hikers shortly after sunrise, and on game days you can watch instant replays on Folsom Field's jumbotron from halfway up the face. But convenience has its benefits: When you're done, you can hike straight off the summit and into the Chautauqua Dining Hall for a post-climb drink.

Best Place to Kayak Inside the City Limits

Confluence Park

It may be rimmed by concrete and smell like feet on its best days, but for city-bound kayakers, Confluence Park is the best place outside of a swimming pool to sneak in an hour or two of after-work paddling. The park is located in the shadow of REI's flagship store, where Cherry Creek meets the South Platte River, and the water's waves and eddies give paddlers a convenient way to practice the basics before striking out on wilder rivers like the Arkansas or the Animas. Confluence Kayaks, located on Platte Street just a block and change from the park, offers beginner lessons in the water for $149 a pop, equipment included.

Best Almost Shooting Fish in a Barrel

Lake Carol Anne

Carol and Punch Bohn, son of legendary boxer Eddie Bohn, run Lake Carol Anne, a private fishing enclave in north Denver. Fishing is belly-boating only, and membership is limited to a hundred — but those lucky fishermen can catch (and release) big bass, channel catfish, crappie, bluegill and brown, rainbow, brook and tiger trout — including the biggest tiger trout ever caught in Colorado. Joe Petrow's catch landed on the cover of a magazine, which brought him to the attention of the state and earned him a thirty-day license suspension, but he got to keep the bragging rights...and avoided a $1,000 penalty.

5880 Lowell Blvd.
303-429-3748

Best Place for Kids to Commune With Nature in the City

Mordecai Children's Garden

Brandon Marshall

Denver Botanic Gardens offers one of the finest examples of nature play around. That's because naturalists used indigenous species, alpine plants and tons of natural materials to craft a legit mountain experience for kids and their families at its Mordecai Children's Garden. The highlight is Springmelt Stream, where children can dam things up with logs, skip stones and surmount rocks to their heart's content. Little ones can meander downhill to Chipotle Homes Harvest Garden — just beyond Pipsqueak Pond — then get elevated at Marmot Mountain, which features a rickety bridge, a picnic nook and furry friends. Because the environment is constantly changing, no two visits to this magical three-acre oasis are ever alike.

Best Cell-Phone Coverage on a Hike

Berrypicker Trail

The Berrypicker trail out of Vail will get you into Colorado's famed scenery quickly as it heads straight up the mountain — the same one you ski in the winter — from either Vail Village or Lionshead. Named for the wild berries that grow alongside it, Berrypicker runs by streams, aspen trees, wildflowers and the occasional moose. But it's so close to town that hikers also have excellent cell reception, allowing them to make reservations — try Mountain Standard for a burger and a craft beer — on their descent. The trail is short but challenging, so you'll be hungry.

Best Hike and a Beer

Mount Sanitas and Sanitas Brewing

Boulder is full of good hikes and great beer, but there's one combination that stands above the others. Perhaps one of the most well-known trails in the area, the Mount Sanitas loop is a rugged three-mile hike that will take you to the rocky top of the 6,843-foot peak. From there, you'll have great views of the surrounding area, and you can pretend to make out Sanitas Brewing off in the distance. You'll certainly be thinking about a delicious saison or a black IPA by the time you and your sore knees get to the bottom. And from the patio of the brewery, you'll be able to gaze up at the peak where you just were.

Best Frisbee Toss and a Beer

Globeville Landing Park and Black Shirt Brewing

Mark Antonation

Globeville Landing Park, at 38th Street and Arkins Court, is home to the only disc-golf course within the Denver city limits, and although it's small and a little rough, it has its charms. Don't own any discs? Hop on the Platte River Greenway or the Cherry Creek Trail and ride to REI to pick some up, then head to the park. The tees are hard to see, so you may want to find a course map online first. After playing nine holes, get back on your bike and ride carefully down 38th and over the bridge to Walnut Street, then walk in the welcoming red door at Black Shirt Brewing. At the brewery, which specializes in beautifully crafted, hoppy red beers, you're likely to find a saison or a porter to help quench that recreational thirst.

Best Way to Meet an Outdoorsy Type Indoors

LuvByrd

When LuvByrd founder Mike Keshian was living in Crested Butte, he realized that it's not always easy for people who love the great outdoors to find like-minded romantic partners, particularly in smaller towns. That was the seed that grew into LuvByrd, a matchmaking website that caters to ski bums, river rats and everyone in between. After signing up, LuvByrd members can choose their favorite activities from a list of dozens, then start making dates to indulge in their passions.

Best Mountain-Bike Trail

Colorado Trail

The Colorado Trail celebrated its fortieth anniversary in 2014, and although it was designed for hiking, the trail's 28 segments are mostly mountain-bike-friendly, too (with the exception of six wilderness areas that you have to detour around). If you were so inclined, you could pedal out from Denver and end up in Durango some 535 miles later in a couple of weeks or so. Colorado Trail "completers" tend to throw around phrases like "life-changing," but even a day trip along any of the trail's segments is worth doing. Either way, get copies of the Colorado Trail Foundation's official guidebook and the CT map book at coloradotrail.org to plan it out properly.

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