Leadville, Colorado..The Two Mile High City

[kcexpress69]

1. Central City, Colorado..The richest square mile on earth.
2. Black Hawk, Colorado, down the road..literally


As the title suggests, Leadville is nearly 2 miles high. At an elevation of 10,152 feet above sea level, it is the highest incorporated city in the United States. You wouldn't think it though by just driving through there. The town does sit on some kind of a plateau so while the streets have a few hills here and there, the area overall is relatively flat. Leadville at one time back in the late 1860s showed promise of a kind of a gold deposit, but there was not enough to produce and make it worthwhile. Instead, they discovered Silver, and Leadville soon became one of the largest silver mining towns in the world. However in the late 20th century, the last mine closed. And Leadville, which at one time had over 10,000 residents, has declined to about 2600 residents in 2010. However, Leadville pushes onward with some tourism and while there is some grit around the town, the downtown is relatively decent. So here we are!!



There was some kind of festival going on downtown that had the main drag coned off and rerouted. It was wrapped up by the time I got there so I don't know what it was about, but there were quite a few people walking around in costumes and people socializing in bars and whatnot.










Maybe a hotel at one time??




This one was in fact the Delaware Hotel













The Leadville Express!!





































A little shot of the mountains in the background














































An old school...looked abandoned.




An old abandoned mine just outside of town..a bike/walking path winds through it.







Graffiti jerks!!







Tracks to nowhere!!




Well, that does it for Leadville..I will now be decending into the central valley for another shoot!! See you there!!

[ShooFlyPie]

Nice, I been there on several occasions while I lived in Denver. One thing I liked about it is it didn't have that Colorado Ski Resort vibe. Yes the resort towns are vibrant and very nice. Yet many of them have the resort vibe as where Leadville is the real deal. A old school Colorado mining town.

In your 7th photo down, what is that? Some 1800s Brothel worker or something??

[Danny]

Very interesting photo tour. Thanks a lot.

Winter there must be very cold, with such altitude... I see the absence of trees, naturally. Life there must be hard.

I´d like to visit Leadville and the whole Colorado state.

Congrats and greetings from Madrid, Spain!

[RockMont]

Spectacular landscape. It would take a pretty tough son-of-a-gun to live at that altitude year round.

[wong21fr]

To be fair, Leadville isn't entirely a tourist town. For years the largest employer was the Climax Molybdenum mine up the road on Highway 91 until the price of moly collapsed in the 80's. Now, the mine has been reopened and will eventually employ about 400 workers which provide a bit of a boost for Leadville. This is a far-cry from the nearly 3,200 workers who were there at the height of the mine's production.

Thanks for the photo-tour! It's really appreciated.

[Cirrus]

I've only been there once, but recall that it's high enough that the air is noticeably different, even when you're just standing there on the sidewalk.

[glowrock]

Been there many times, and yes, breathing is noticeably more difficult just walking along the main drag downtown. It's what you get for being at nearly two miles high! Great photos, of course!

For what it's worth, the National Mining Museum is pretty fascinating for those who have an eye for either geology, engineering and/or history!

Aaron (Glowrock)

[xzmattzx]

Looks like a nice place. Always nice to see a building or other thing named after my state!

[Centropolis]

nice little tour. my brain would probably hemmorage pork grease or something at that altitude, i immediately always get woozy above 6,000 feet.

[ColDayMan]

I went there a little more than 20 years ago and it looks like I remember it. Thanks.