Exploring Caribou Ghost Town: The Haunting Remains of the Past

Common suggestions for a Halloween adventure often include a visit to a haunted house – ones with actors, manufactured sets, and plenty of thrilling scares. But have you considered putting a different sort of haunt into your itinerary? Perhaps a location of desolation and abandon? Where ghosts of the past haunt the scene before you rather than those covered with fabric?

As leaf peepers flood the rocky mountains in high-traffic tree zones, I head for somewhere forgotten; A ghost town called Caribou located 20 miles north of Boulder, Colorado.

Here, I spend a few hours taking in the fall scenery and reflecting on the remnants of this lost place.

Finding a hidden ghost

Getting to Caribou includes a modern scare: finding a location that isn’t on Google Maps. I had been there before with someone who knew the way, but this time, I wasn’t exactly sure where to find it.

So with plenty of snacks, my friends and I head up to the Rockies through Golden Gate Canyon. We pass by parking attendants directing cars due to the high volume of leaf viewers. I had hoped to make a stop at Panorama Point Scenic Overlook for a wider scope of the mountains, but alas, we find that the lot is full.

We contine along the Peak to Peak Highway to Nederland, a funky mountain town that was once the home of Frozen Dead Guy Days. Caribou is located not far above Nederland, and at this point in the drive, I have input Caribou Ranch into my map. I guessed this would be close enough to get us to the abandoned spot. Nope. After taking a dead-end road, we realize this was not the correct area, and perhaps need to double back to turn onto Caribou Road instead.

Indeed, upon skeptically driving up Caribou Road for several minutes, the stone wall ruins of the ghost town suddenly spring up on the right along with… not much else besides mountain scenery. Why are there only a few partial buildings left?

It began with a silver mine

One thing brought flocks of people to these rugged locations – mining. The mountains where Caribou sat were veined with silver, and it wasn’t long before Caribou Mine was up and running. To house the miners, the town of Caribou was established in the early 1870s, with the town’s peak reaching 3,000 residents in 1875. At this time, you could find a church, three saloons, a brewery, and a town newspaper called the Caribou Post. There were over 100 buildings, so what happened to them?

Unfortunately, a fire burnt through most of the town in 1879. By the 1920s, less than 50 people lived in Caribou. By then, the mines were abandoned, although the Caribou Mine has since been reopened in the 1980s and is still in operation.

That which lingers

Today, sitting at its elevation of 9,971 feet, Caribou is nothing more than the remains of two stone buildings, a collapsed wood cabin, and a boarded-up mining entrance. It’s not much of a ghost town comparing it to the likes of St. Elmo or Bodie in California. However, it’s eerie knowing that this location used to be so much more.

Through fires and time, its tangible history has been wiped away, and only a small portion still hangs on. Looking down the road, I imagine where the three saloons sat, where houses would’ve dotted the hillside, and where the post office sent out the Caribou Post. I imagine miners and their families walking through the town, wondering if they would frown or smile as they passed by, and if they liked their life here. I try to conjure the sounds of the mine and the noises of a population of 3,000 people compared to its current stillness.

And even with these haunting scenes playing out, I couldn’t help but admire the beautiful area where this town once stood. The mountains spotted with gold. A white crowned sparrow perched atop the brush. The cooler air much welcomed, while the rocks and stones warm from the sun. Even a bull moose peacefully grazes not 30 feet away from our car, camouflaged by the trees.

The moose kept to himself and eventually wandered into the forest

While a little spooky at times, I also find Caribou to be oddly comforting. I think: maybe it’s alright that not much of this town is left, as long as there’re still people who come to visit it.