Food
Little Engine Eatery
A hot dog train parked in the shadow of the courthouse, serving dogs named for railroads: the Chicago L, the Rio Grande, a Southern Pacific built on Stubb’s barbecue sauce. The real reason to stop is behind the counter: since 2017 the owners have run it as a place where young adults with learning differences can work.
Eddyline Brewery
The eddy line is the seam between the current and the calm water sitting behind a rock, which is a fair description of what a good beer is for. This is where downtown Buena Vista ends up after dark: around twenty taps, half the staff river guides. Get the Crank Yanker IPA and the wood-fired pizza.
Outdoors
Mount Princeton Hot Springs Resort
Chalk Creek runs straight off the snowpack, but it sits on a fault line, so hot springs bubble up through the rocks along the bank. Climb into a pool built right in the creek bed and you get both at once: scalding underneath, ice water washing over the top. Folks have soaked here since 1879.
Brown's Canyon Whitewater Rafting
The Arkansas is one of the most rafted rivers in America: about 200,000 people run it every summer. Book an outfitter in town and you’ll put in above Browns Canyon National Monument, 20,000 acres of protected canyon you can really only see from the water. Then hang on for Canyon Doors, Pinball and Zoom Flume.
Mount Princeton
A “14er” is any peak over 14,000 feet; Colorado has 58 of them and Mount Princeton tops out around 14,200. Start early: the danger up here isn’t the climb, it’s the storms that build by midday. Past the tree line you trade trail for scree fields marked only by cairns. Bring layers; there’s still snow in July.
