Gold Hill

Gold Hill is a classic mountain town tucked up, up and away above the city of Boulder. At 8,300 feet the town gets snow and ice and also a lot of sunshine. Even before the September 2010 Four Mile Canyon wildfire Gold Hill's 200 plus residents have a serious, close knit, loving community. That fire destroyed approximately 170 homes in and around the town but firefighters managed to barely keep the flames from consuming the historic wooden homes and buildings.

The little school house in town is part of the Boulder Valley School District, my nephew went to school there until 2nd grade when he started going to Nederland schools instead. The little school house has a great reputation but kids from all ages are put together in almost the same way that pioneer one room school houses used to be.

There is a great "Inn" with a restaurant and bar and live music that acts as the town centre, otherwise residents go down into Boulder or Longmont to buy groceries etc...The drive takes about 25 minutes when the weather is fair.

The town is famous for the mining area that it sits above called Gold Run, the first lode discovery of gold in Colorado (1859). Gold Hill then became the first permenant mining camp in Colorado, but then it was still part of the Nebraska Territory.

There is a lot of history and some really amazing buildings and barns (old and new) in the area. As mentioned, the fire of 2010 did destroy a lot of homes and forest in the area. One of the good things that came out of the fire was that a natural burn zone now exists guarding the town from many angles, reducing the chances for another catastrophic fire in the near future. Much of the fuel that a fire needs was cleared away in smoke and ash.

The drive up to Gold Hill is great and I have known a lot of friends that lived up in Gold HIll, renting a home, for a one year period. They loved it but the winters and the drive got to them after awhile and they were back living in Boulder.