Red Rock Canyon Open Space

Red Rock Canyon Open Space is a 787-acre property located between Colorado Springs and Manitou Springs.  Palmer Land Trust holds a conservation easement on approximately 652 acres of the property.  The majority of Red Rock Canyon remains in a natural state, offering unique opportunities to view geologic formations, natural plant communities, wildlife, and impressive vistas of the surrounding foothills - including marvelous views of Garden of the Gods. 

Red Rock Canyon Open Space is also rich in historical, archeological, and cultural value.  Artifacts found on the property are evidence of the many prehistoric cultures that utilized the area.  Of more recent history, mining, quarrying, and homesteading activity are also visible throughout the open space.

The Red Rock Canyon Open Space property is an important public resource.  It provides a number of educational and recreational opportunities.  With interpretive signs, markers, and kiosks, guests have the chance to learn about the unique geological features, cultural and historical significance, and biological resources that the property possesses.  Moreover, the extensive trail network gives hikers and mountain bikers of all skill levels extensive opportunities to explore.

Directions: Red Rock Canyon Open Space is located along Highway 24.  From I-25, take the Cimarron Street exit west.  Cimarron Street will turn into Highway 24.  After the 31st light, turn left onto Ridge Road.  Red Rock Canyon will be on the south side of the street.  The parking lot is located at the end of Ridge Road.  

In Praise of Red Rock Canyon Open Space

 

…when we first see [this country] we know it’s beautiful.  [But]

we cannot take everything.  We have to leave some for the next generation.

                                                                        –‘Red Ute’ Eddie Box, Sr. 

 

We sing the praises of these sculpted red rocks

that have stood the test of time for three-hundred-million-years –

vertical as the plummeting drop of a red-winged hawk,

sharp as an arrowhead, flint-lapped and chisel-edged.

 

We sing the praises of these ancient frozen dunes –

the hematite-red Lyons sandstone, stretched like sleeping basilisks

                rounded like a whale’s humped back;   

We praise the tilted Fountain fins – leaning towers of stone,

             Mother Earth’s curved ribs, shaped like a bow,

                                      tapered center poles,

       the color of madder root and sun-lit rose,

        propping up the sky’s blue tent, blue as a robin’s egg.

 

We sing the praises of these up-thrusting, salmon-red leaping

          pinnacles; the blunt, snub-nosed, time-worn mesas,

the chalky, shell-white, Dakota hog-back ridges,

spiny and bent, wizened as an ancient Grandmother –

                            hunched like wickiups.

We celebrate the copper-red cañons – glowing

                with the first uncontained fires of a western dawn.

 

We lift up our voices in infinite praises of the sacred homes

      of Eagle, Coyote, Skunk, Owl, Rabbit and Crow, home of Puma

in his secretive, bleached-bone-littered lair. Home of the silver-fluting

notes of the caňon wren, home of zigzagging shuttles and serpent-

       twisting bolts of light, home of the scrub oak and piñon,

the needle-shimmering, hushed chants 

                   of wind rivers in the sky-touching pines.

 

We praise the high rocky ledges,

                   the protective shaded hollows,

       the cave-dark home of Black Bear.

We sing the praises of those early first inhabitants

          whose eagle-winged and soaring spirits still hunt and gather here

 

                                                                  - Ruth Obee