For the past two years my wife and I have travelled to SE Colorado and car camped for a week. We would like to do it again this year.

Is Colorado open? We usually stay at little RV parks at places like Pagosa Springs, Ouray, Buena Vista, etc.

We like to to window shop and eat out at breakfast joints and various mom and pops restaurants.

How are things going up there?

those places are not in SE Colorado.

The state is slowly opening.  However, consider that several mountain counties are prohibiting any non-resident from entry.  

no camping in state parks now.

Colorado government is insane.  just like cali/or/wa

fuck 'em

go spend your money in a state that will appreciate it.

Various Colorado counties have implemented restrictions on short term accommodations including campgrounds (whether private or government operated), reserved camping sites, hotels, motels, short term rentals of 30 days or less(e.g., Airbnb, VRBO, timeshares, RV parks, bed and breakfasts, condo-tels, lodges and retreats).  Check with the local county public-health department to see what restrictions might apply in your situation.  Most of the mountain counties (Summit, Eagle, Pitkin) have been hit as hard or even harder on a per-capita basis than those with big cities like Denver, Colorado Springs and Boulder (see link below to case data by county). The smaller communities have very limited hospital capacity and thus the fear that they could be over-run by the usual summer crowd of out-of-state visitors who could bring the virus with them.  Some parks are open and some are closed (see link below) and those are moving targets so check frequently before making your final plans.  Good luck and be safe.


Colorado Case Data By County


Park Closure Data

Go to WY/MT/ID/UT instead.  

I am on the W. slope, and have two clients that own one of the hotels in Ouray.

If you come here in June, I would tell you that you're rolling the dice on your vacation.

I would love to say otherwise, tourist $ is THE major industry in this area.

San Juan County (Silverton), is currently locals only, all others go home. Seriously, not even national forest access to non-San Juan residents.

I don't know about the areas that you are referencing.  I have a vacation rental property in Steamboat Springs and it is essentially locked down until 06/01.  I don't know anything beyond that.  The dribble coming from local officials is that their empty hospitals can't handle all of the sick people that they would have if they opened the county up for visitors.  

A friend of mine from that area took their family camping, hiking, mountain biking in the Fruita area recently.  They said that it was packed.  I had a neighbor go to Moab over the weekend from the Denver area.  I haven't seen him yet to find out about his travels, but they must not have turned them away because he has been gone for several days.  I am assuming that most of these "rules" cannot be enforced as law.  With that being said, I would just start calling around to any camp sites you might use or checking websites for specific areas.  Unless something changes by June, national parks are still closed

Nope, Polis just closed it for the summer.        Closed

Well there goes a chunk of our economy

what economy?

it's gone now and it's not coming back anytime soon.  The smart ones closed the doors mid March at the first "two weeks" declaration and said "fuck it, I'm out" and stopped the bleeding right then.

Damn
We're still going next month, we own a house there

Yes, sir. I had a brain blip. I should have said SW Colorado.

Thank you to everyone who replied. I may head up to Montana or Wyoming, instead.

Where is the house?  Check with local websites.  Our neighbors brother came in from Eagle County and said they were opened back up pretty well.  Everything that I am getting from Routt County is that they are hell bent on crushing their local businesses

Near Pagosa Springs in Archuleta County. Inlaws just got back from there, said more than a few things in there area were open

I came to ask about July. That article isn't very reassuring.

We are supposed to be in C Springs area the first week of June for house hunting. The CO Covid-19 site doesn’t really spell out if I can/should still plan for this.

Spent 13 years in Teller County before making the horrible decision to move to Florida two years ago. Trying to fix the situation.

We have a trip planned to Durango next month (around 6/21) for my sons birthday. Planned on doing Mesa verde, silverton railroad, etc..

Anybody know how things look down there? I checked la plata county’s website and see the “turn in your neighbor” form right on the front page.

I'm going to Park County in mid-June. If any LE challenges me I will state I am traveling in interstate commerce. Not that they'll understand it, but of course Congress controls interstate commerce, not the governor of Colorado. The lawsuits and precedents can proceed from that.

Housing is considered essential as far as I know.  There were some rules around being able to show homes and open houses, but I don't know what has changed.  If you are working with a realtor they should be able to tell you.

This article came out yesterday.  It doesn't cover everything, but does cover some outdoor spots.

They wont stop you unless you're speeding, or doing something stupid entirely. My best friend is a Park co deputy. Please refrain from referring to him as ignorant.

Thank you for that. I keep trying to keep up and talking with friends in state but it's a point of so much information that it's not really reliable information.

I really wanted to hit the passes we missed last year and show my dad the "inside" of the Rockies. But I think we'll just head straight towards Utah.

Does all this mean that when I drive down to TX I should go around CO?  

Serious question.  I don't want to be hassled by LEO because I have out-of-state plates on my car.

No worries Bitmap.  I'm back and forth all the time between TX and CO and nothing like that is happening.   Drove up to CO on March 16 and back to TX on April 17 with no problems.  Have a good friend who just drove up to CO from FL and nothing, nada, happened.   Eagle county has just gotten permission from the State to open up short term lodging restrictions (<30 days) and now Summit county has made the same requests.   CO's life blood is tourism and even their liberal governor Polis is leading the charge with reopening as much of CO as possible (low incidence rates on positives).

My wife has been whining for weeks about getting out of the house and enjoying some scenery.  Not sure how much longer I can hold out,  especially since we have had record heat above 100 already.

Paladin

I have out of state plates still.  No one has batted an eye at me.  I see a lot of out of state plates, including Texas.  I also had a neighbor, who does have CO plates, drive to Utah and back with a trailer and ATV without issue.  You should be fine

Thank you for the info.

I drove from Denver to Pagosa/Durango/Cortez and back through Moab/Grand Junction/Vail last week.

No worries about driving through these areas.  Lots and lots of people out and about license plates from all over.  You really can't tell there's a virus going on, as there are the same number of cars out there.  Hotels are mostly empty, though, and I think all restaurants are close (take-out only).

Moab was a ghost town a month ago, but now it seems about 50% of normal traffic/people.

Just heard that restaurants are opening dine in seating at 50% capacity starting next Wednesday.  

Lots of people out and about this weekend. I think you should be good OP unless something else happens.

https://www.9news.com/mobile/article/news/health/coronavirus/colorado-restaurants-reopening-in-person-dining-guidance-coronavirus-covid-19/73-117e3ad4-cbe4-460a-ac3e-8a0882decd65

The Summit Daily News has this article about various reopenings State and Counties are Reopening Various Businesses

The article also says "Private campsites may open Monday, May 25, but if a county would like to keep campsites closed, county commissioners can consult their local public health agency and then notify the Colorado Department of Natural Resources and Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. State park campsites are already open."

I think you can finally make your travel plans.

Awesome!

Colorado is still Plan A for us, but we have an established Plan B just in case. We're even limiting who gets to go so we don't run into too many issues.

I have a week reserved at the Ouray KOA.  Even if they allow the campgrounds to open how will the local trails be?  Are they even bothering to clear them this year?

In July 2019 there were still quite a few trails closed due to snowfall and trail damage.  I wonder if it's even worth my time to try to keep those reservations.

I can't speak to Ouray, but we hit a couple state parks near by and they were busy and clear.  I use All Trails to find the places that I want to check out.  You can get a lot of info off of there by looking at recent reviews and pictures.  Routt county is opening things back up this week so we are planning to head up there this weekend if the weather looks good.  I will report back on that area if we make it.

Sweet, thanks!

We stayed at the Ouray KOA last year.  We really enjoyed it.  They have new owners and the new owners seem like nice people from our interactions with them.  We were out there to ride our RZR on the trails.  

Last year (2018-2019 winter) the area had record snow fall. While I don't have first hand information on this past winter's snowfall, from what I have read, it didn't snow nearly as much so I would think the trails should open sooner.

Trails are totally fine. They're mostly cleared by volunteers and with our lock down having outdoor recreation as an exemption, they were well taken care of. I've been on many of the usual ones with a plan to hit Blue Lakes in the next month

So did we, last July during the FJ Summit.  It was kinda pricey for primitive tent spots but the campgrounds had everything we needed.  The BBQ and live music on the weekends wasn't half bad either.



Awesome!  Thanks!  I'm hoping to hit Black bear and Imogene since they were still closed during my visit last year.

Shit I just booked a cabin for early July.

Teller County.

We were out there the end of Sept so we didn’t get to try their BBQ. We stayed in one of their cabins. A little pricy but still cheaper than a hotel in CO.

We are going back later this summer but plan to camp near Silverton this time.

Went from Douglas county to Routt county last weekend.  There was plenty of traffic but even leaving on a Friday, at what should be rush hour, we made it in good time.  I saw vehicles from CA, FL, NE, UT, One of the Dakotas (don't remember which).  I still have out of state plates (we can finally fix that this month) and no one cared.  At a trailhead there were two women talking about all of the out of state plates in the parking lot.  Coming back every vehicle seemed to be towing a camper or trailer with ATV's or they had bikes or kayaks attached.  It seems like people aren't shy about getting out.

Some notes for Steamboat/Routt County:
- Masks are required inside of retail/restaurants.  If you go into a restaurant you are supposed to wear the mask until you are seated.  All of the tables are 6 feet apart and a couple places told me that they were supposed to be getting approval to expand their patio to the sidewalk areas to get more tables.  The places that we went to were as busy as they could allow which we were happy to see.  I hope they give those places enough capacity to pay the bills and weather the storm over the summer.  One of the places where we ate went to hanging banners and TV's for the menus to make it easier.  I think they still had regular menus if you needed them, but it made it so they didn't have to go to a disposable menu.  One place asked for our info for contact tracing, but only one.  Most of the small business retail shops that we saw were open.  The big brand stores (like northface, marmot, under armour etc) seem to still be shut down nationwide.  
- The short term lodging ban is scheduled to end as of today.  The property managers that I get emails from have indicated that they would open the pool, but they were required to keep the numbers low and they would require people to essentially book time to be at the pool.  I am sure that every place will be different, but that is what ours is saying.  
-The hiking trails that we were on were in good shape and mostly dry.  If you found mud it was a small patch and we didn't encounter snow.  
-Rabbit ears pass still has a ton of snow and you can see patches of snow as you look up Mt. Werner.

Looks like fire restrictions may stay in place all summer for a lot of areas if you were thinking of dispersed camping.
From the USFS website:


"The Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests and Pawnee National Grassland is under Stage 1 fire restrictions, along with the Pike and San Isabel National Forests and Cimmaron and Comanche National Grasslands, until rescinded. Please note, this could last throughout the summer if needed."

Those are just the ones listed. Not sure about further west.

I was in Gunnison and Buena Vista this week.  Tons of TX plates around.  Almost more than normal, if that's possible.  Holiday Inn / Gunnison was full.  Buena Vista restaurants are mostly closed, but opening now.  Eddyline Brewery is only restaurant 100% open, but spacing out customers.  You need to wear a mask to and from your table.  Don't give them crap about wearing a mask.  Just deal with it.

Been in pagosa springs since Saturday,  most stuff is open. Pretty good crowds.

Did the Alpine Loop Wednesday,  it's freaking beautiful
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Hanging out in my backyard

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What’s with the big ass coat dude? It’s summer for crying out loud.

Thats true. I know it was at least 60/65 up there

Parking area at Animas Forks?

Yep! It was chilly with the wind up there!

Thought it looked familiar. Beautiful area is an understatement!  Gonna be up there later this year to ride the trails.