Denver is a vibrant city with 300 days of annual sunshine, year-round adventure and the breathtaking Rocky Mountains in our backyard. From a thriving arts and culture scene, world class attractions and endless shopping possibilities, to nationally recognized chefs, exciting nightlife and abundant outdoor recreation, Denver welcomes you to experience, explore and discover how the Mile High City will awaken your senses like nowhere else.
10 Things to Know About Denver
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Denver really is exactly one mile high. By incredible good luck, there is a step on the State Capitol Building that is exactly 5,280 feet above sea level. In Denver’s rarified air, golf balls go ten percent farther. So do cocktails. Alcoholic drinks pack more of a wallop than at sea level. The sun feels warmer, because you’re closer to it, but your coffee is cooler, because water boils at 202 degrees. Mile High Denver is also extremely dry, so it is good idea to drink more water than normal. With less water vapor in the air at this altitude, the sky really is bluer in Colorado. But there’s 25 percent less protection from the sun, so sunscreen is a must.
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Denver has the 10th largest downtown in America. Unlike some Western cities, Denver has a definitive, exciting and walkable downtown – the 10th largest in the nation. Within a mile radius, downtown Denver has three major sports stadiums, the nation’s second largest performing arts center, three colleges with 30,000 students, an assortment of art and history museums, a mint producing 10 billion coins a year, a river offering white water rafting, over 5,300 hotel rooms, a $140 million amusement park, a $100 million aquarium with sharks and sea otters and well over 300 restaurants.
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Denver is near the mountains, not in them. Denver might not be in the mountains, but the mountains dominate Denver. There are 200 named peaks visible from Denver, including 32 that soar to 13,000 feet and above. The mountain panorama visible from Denver is 140 miles long. State law prohibits building any structure that would block the view from the State Capitol. To penetrate the mountains west of Denver, required building the highest auto tunnel in the world (Eisenhower Tunnel) and the longest railroad tunnel in North America (the Moffat Tunnel).
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Denver has 300 days of sunshine a year. Located east of a major mountain range, Denver has a mild, dry and sunny climate with more annual hours of sun than San Diego or Miami Beach. Golf courses remain open all year and have been played as many as 30 days in January. The average daily high in February is 45 degrees – warmer than New York, Philadelphia or St. Louis.
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Denver’s history is short, but colorful. Prior to1858, there were no permanent residents in the Denver metro area. Thirty years later, Colorado was a state with a population of almost 200,000 people. It was a Gold Rush that caused this boom, and in a 30 to 40 year period Denver saw some of the wildest events in the Wild, Wild West. This fascinating period lives again in museums, old gold mining villages and hundreds of wonderful, elegant Victorian buildings that can be found throughout the city, many of them now housing restaurants, shops and hotels.
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Denver has the largest city park system in the nation. Denver has more than 200 parks within the city and 20,000 acres of parks in the nearby mountains, including spectacular Red Rocks Amphitheatre. There are 650 miles of off-street bike paths, 90 golf courses, one of the nation’s largest urban trail systems and Denver owns its own ski area – Winter Park Resort. Denver pets fare well too. Denver was selected as the #1 city for dogs and cats in May 2003 by the Purina Pet Institute. They rated Denver as the healthiest city for pets because the Denver metro area has the most veterinarians per capita and the fewest fleas.
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Denver is a cultural city with the highest educated population in America. In its Old West days, Denver had a performance of Macbeth before it had a school or a hospital. That performance took place in a saloon. Today, the Denver Performing Arts Complex has nine theatres seating 10,000 people and is second only to New York’s Lincoln Center.
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Denver also loves its sports. Denver is one of only a few cities to have eight professional sports teams including the NFL Denver Broncos, the NBA Denver Nuggets, NHL Colorado Avalanche; Major League Baseball’s Colorado Rockies, Major League Soccer’s Colorado Rapids, the Arena Football Denver Crush, the Colorado Outlaws outdoor Lacrosse team and the indoor Lacrosse team Colorado Mammoth. Denver also has horse and dog racing, professional rodeo and an annual Grand Prix on Labor Day Weekend. Denver is the only city to build three new stadiums in the 1990s: 50,000-seat Coors Field; 75,000-seat INVESCO Field at Mile High, and 20,000-seat Pepsi Center.
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Denver is a city of many colors and cultures with great diversity. Denver grew by 30 percent in the 1990s – an average of 1,000 new people a week, every week for ten years. In this period, the Hispanic population in Colorado increased by 73 percent. Today, 32 percent of the City of Denver is of Hispanic and Latino descent and 11 percent are African American. Denver’s diversity is celebrated at numerous festivals and events including the nation’s largest Cinco de Mayo celebration and the annual Juneteenth and Dragon Boat Festival.
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Denver brews more beer than any other city. The first building in Denver was a saloon, so it’s natural that Denver would become a great beer town. Coors Brewery is the world’s largest. Denver’s Great American Beer Festival is the largest in the nation with 1,400 different beers. The Wynkoop Brewing Company is the largest brewpub in America. On an average day, Denver brews more than 80 different beers.
Source(s): Denver Metro Convention & Visitors Bureau
Out and About in Denver
The Neighborhoods
The City and County of Denver has defined 79 official neighborhoods. These neighborhoods do not include outer cities or suburbs, which are separate entities from the metro area.
The neighborhoods' character vary significantly from each other and include everything from large skyscrapers to turn century houses to modern, suburban-style developments. Generally, the neighborhoods closest to the city center are denser, older and contain more brick building material. Many neighborhoods away from the city center were developed after World War II, and are built with more modern materials and style. Some of the neighborhoods even further from the city center, or recently redeveloped parcels anywhere in the city have either very suburban characteristics or are new urbanist developments that attempt to recreate the feel of older neighborhoods. Most neighborhoods contain parks or other feature that is the focal point for the neighborhood.
Some of the more well-known neighborhoods include the historic and trendy LoDo (short for "Lower Downtown"), part of the city's Union Station neighborhood; Capitol Hill, Highland, Washington Park (Wash Park); Uptown, part of the North Capitol Hill neighborhood; Curtis Park, part of the Five Points neighborhood; Alamo Placita, the northern part of the Speer neighborhood; Park Hill, a successful example of intentional racial integration; and Golden Triangle, in the Civic Center.
Parks and Recreation
Denver has over 200 parks, from the small "mini-parks" sprinkled throughout the city to the giant 314 acre City Park to the 40,000 acre Denver Mountain Parks. Denver also has 28 recreation centers providing places and programming for resident's recreation and relaxation.
In addition to the parks within Denver itself, the city acquired land for mountain parks starting in the 1910s. Over the years, Denver has acquired, built and maintained around 40,000 acres of mountain parks, the most famous being Red Rocks Park, which is known just as much for its scenery as its musical history revolving around the Red Rocks Amphitheatre. Denver also owns Winter Park Resort ski area in Grand County, 60 miles west of Denver, which the city partners with Intrawest Resort Company, to operate the ski resort. City parks are important places for the both Denverites and visitors alike. Denver continues to grow its park system with the development of many new parks along the Platte River through the city and in the Stapleton neighborhood redevelopment. All of these parks are important gathering places for residents and allow what was once a dry plain to be lush, active, and green.
Transportation
If you've flown into Denver, or plan to, you will familiarize yourself with Denver International Airport. It is the tenth busiest airport in the world and ranks fifth in the United States, with 47,324,844 passengers passing through it in 2006.
Mass transportation throughout the Denver metro area is managed and coordinated by RTD with a mass of buses serving over 10,000 bus stops around the Denver area. Additionally, RTD operates six light rail lines serving 37 stations. FasTracks, an expansion project approved by voters in 2004, will allow light rail to serve cities such as Lakewood, Golden, and Aurora. Amtrak provides service to Denver daily in both directions between Chicago and Emeryville, California and Amtrak Thruway service operated by private bus companies links the Denver station with Rocky Mountain points. Additionally, there is the Ski Train operated by the Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, which takes passengers between Denver and the Winter Park Ski Resort. Denver's early years as a major train hub of the west are still very visible today. Trains stop in Denver at historic Union Station, where travelers can access RTD's 16th Street Free MallRide or use light rail to tour the city. Union Station will also serve as the main juncture for rail travel in the metro area, at the completion of FasTracks.
Source(s): Wikipedia
Dining in Denver
There are so many great restaurants in Denver, it is difficult to compile a list. Below I will list some of our favorite spots to dine by neighborhood.
LoDo
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Rioja - fantastic food, wonderful ambience and wine list.
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Wazee Supper Club - great pizzas, fun atmosphere, good service.
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Zengo - trendy, pricey but oh so good!
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Illegal Pete's - Fish Burrito... yum!!! Very casual, fresh ingredients.
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Vesta Dipping Grill - fun, contemporary dipping restaurant (NOT fondue)
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Little India - great Indian food.
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My Brother's Bar - great burgers, one of Denver's oldest bars. Nice patio in the warmer months.
Highland Neighborhood
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Lola - the escolar (fish) and flatiron steak dishes are amazing! Guac made tableside... and the views of Denver outstanding!
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Duo Restaurant - fresh, local ingredients. Small but wonderful menu.
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Highland Garden Cafe - very romantic. Large menu, fantastic food. Great brunch on the weekends.
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Tacqueria Mexicana - hole in the wall close to my heart. Awesome carnitas!!
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North Star Brewery - fun new neighborhood bar. Who doesn't love tater tots on the menu?!
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Tacos Jalisco - great authentic Mexican.
Uptown
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Chedd's Gourmet Grilled Cheese - need I say more?
- Steuben's - absolutely wonderful! A fun retro atmosphere featuring sophisticated comfort food.
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Parallel Seventeen - interesting, delicious asian fusion, great cocktails.
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Wok Uptown - the best Asian take out I've found (so far).
Five Points/Whittier/City Park
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Tom's Home Cooking - open only for lunch, this little spot features comforting Southern food.
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M&D's BBQ - great bbq and very close to home (an excellent combination)!
Park Hill
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Tables - small spot, ecclectic decor, fantastic food.
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Cherry Tomato - a bustling neighborhood favorite with yummy Italian. Try the chef's specialty, Pasta Felese .
Golden Triangle
Cherry Creek
Capital Hill
Denver FAN-atics
Denver LOVES it's sports!! Thankfully, the city is one of the select few that have teams in four major sports. For football, the Denver Broncos have been able to draw crowds of nearly 70,000 since their AFL origins in the early 60's and continue to sell out games at Invesco Field at Mile High. The Broncos have advanced to the Super Bowl six times and won back-to-back in '98 and '99. In the '80s and '90s, one of the top priorities of former Mayor Federico Peña was to bring a major league baseball team to the city, an effort brought the construction of Coors Field and the creation of the Colorado Rockies as an expansion team in '93. Denver is also home to the Colorado Avalanche, a National Hockey League team that relocated from Quebec City in '95. They have won two Stanley Cups (1996 and 2001) and play at Pepsi Center, which also hosts the Denver Nuggets of the NBA, the Colorado Mammoth of the National Lacrosse League and the Colorado Crush of the Arena Football League.
Source(s): Wikipedia
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Mountains Were Made for Skiing!
Colorado has some of the most majestic, technical, and fun runs in the world. Below are all of the resort areas found in Colorado:
Arapahoe Basin
Arrowhead Ski Area
Aspen Highlands (part of Aspen/Snowmass)
Aspen Mountain (part of Aspen/Snowmass)
Beaver Creek
Berthoud Pass
Breckenridge
Buttermilk (part of Aspen/Snowmass)
Copper Mountain
Crested Butte
Cuchara
Durango Mountain (formerly Purgatory)
Echo Mountain Park
Eldora
Hesperus
Howelsen
Keystone
Loveland
Monarch
Powderhorn
Silverton Mountain
Ski Cooper
Snowmass (part of Aspen/Snowmass)
SolVista
Steamboat Ski Resort
Sunlight
Telluride
Vail
Winter Park/Mary Jane
Wolf Creek
So many peaks, so little time!!
Get Ready for the Outdoors
The main draw for residents of Denver? The easy access and plentitude of fun outdoor activities. Skiing, camping, climbing, mountain biking, rafting, hiking, snow-shoeing, boarding... you name it!
 | Cabela's
“The worlds foremost outfitter” Cabela's is the leading retailer of some of the world's finest hunting, fishing and camping gear, as well as both men's and women's outdoor apparel. The leader in the outdoor equipment business has survived, grown and prospered from simple beginnings to become the largest mail-order, retail and Internet outdoor outfitter in the world. From canoes, kayaks, fishing rods, tents, outerwear, footwear, home décor items and so much more, Cabela's offers an immense select... |
 | Camping World
Camping World: Gear up at your RV and camping superstore!
Products include: recreational vehicles, trailers, accessories, parts, and supplies. |
 | Dick's Sporting Goods
Dick's Sporting Goods offers items for exercise equipment, footwear, apparel, team sports water sports, outdoors, rec room and fan shop. Dick's has brands like TaylorMade, New Balance, Nike, Adidas, Callaway Golf, Bowflex, Reebok, and Under Armor. Dick's has cardio equipment, elliptical machines, treadmills, yoga, pilates, and weight training. Dick's has team sports equipment for baseball, basketball, cricket, field hockey, football, cheerleading, soccer, volleyball, softball, gymnastics and ... |
 | Eastern Mountain Sports
Eastern Mountain Sports offers the best outdoor gear and clothing for the active outdoor enthusiast. Eastern Mountain Sports carries a complete inventory of camping and climbing equipment, backpacks, and cycling gear, to insulated parkas and summer shorts. Eastern Mountain Sports customers can choose from the very best name brands in the outdoor industry, including The North Face, Mountain Hardwear, Teva, Kelty, and many others. The backcountry veterans who staff Eastern Mountain Sports product ... |
 | Edwin Watts Golf
Edwin Watts Golf carries a complete inventory of pro-line equipment, apparel, and accessories at competitive prices to fit any budget. Every club, putter, and iron utilizes the latest materials and technology to help you hit straighter shots and score lower than ever before. Edwin Watts Golf has all the newly released golf clubs and equipment to assist you in making the most of every round, with great brands like Callaway, Titleist, Taylormade, Ping, Nike, Cleveland, Cobra, Mizuno, MacGregor & m... |
 | Golfsmith
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 | Mountain Gear
Mountain Gear has Men & Women’s Clothing, Footwear & Gear. You can buy items by activity & brand at Mountain Gear. Activities supplied by Mountain Gear are climbing, camping, hiking, snow sports, trail running, fitness, canyoneering, paddle sports & travel. Brands sold by Mountain Gear are The North Face, Mountain Hardwear, Arcteryx, Marmot, Patagonia, & Black Diamond. Gear sold by Mountain Gear includes snowboards, helmets, harness, rock shoes, rope, navigation, first aid, clothing, car racks. ... |
 | Orvis
Orvis is your leading destination for distinctive clothing, gear, luggage & home goods. Orvis is America's oldest mail order company and a sporting tradition since 1856. Orvis sells a wide array of products including Men's and Women's apparel, Gokey Footwear, Home Furnishings, Men's Watches, Fly Fishing Gear, Fly Rods, Fly Reels, Slippers, Briefcases, Pet beds, Sweaters, Coats, Leather Jackets, Watches, Bed Spreads, Men's Shoes, Skirts, Lamps, Men's Shirts, and Quilts. Frequent travelers will fi... |
 | Outdoor Superstore
Outdoor Superstore helps their customers get the greatest enjoyment from their favorite outdoor sports by providing them with the widest selection of merchandise at affordable prices. Choose from an amazing variety of fun and exciting merchandise, some of which includes archery, camping, fishing, and hunting equipment as well as paintball, marine and shooting products. Outdoor Superstore has everything you need for the great outdoors.
To receive your automatic cash rebate from Outdoor Su... |
 | Skis.com
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 | SnowShack
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 | Sport Chalet
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What's so great about Denver?
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