Mile High Trail
Capital Birding
Denver, the Mile High City, is famous as the gateway to the Rocky Mountains and as the capital city of Colorado. It also has an excellent system of parks and natural areas that make it possible to find nature right in town, including nesting night-herons and Snowy Egrets, wintering Cackling Geese, and Violet-green Swallows in summer. This trail covers only the central metro area; there are so many excellent birding sites on the outskirts of Denver that we had to split them off into the Waterfowl Trail (northeast), the Castlewood Trail (southeast), the Urban Refuges Trail (southwest), and the Red Rocks Trail (west).
Sites on this Trail
- Bear Creek Greenbelt (Jefferson portion)
- Bear Creek Greenbelt (Denver section)
- Belmar Historic Park
- Sloan’s Lake
- Berkeley Lake and Rocky Mountain Lake
- Heron Pond/Heller Open Space
- City Park
- Cheesman Park and Denver Botanic Gardens
- Washington Park
- Fairmount Cemetery
- Aurora-Kelley Reservoir/Westerly Wetlands
- Bluff Lake Nature Center
- Sand Creek Greenway
- Utah Park and Jewell Wetlands
- High Line Canal (Denver Section)