AMERICAN ROCKIES
T
HE MOVE FROM THE
great plains of eastern
Colorado to the mountains
of the west feels as precise
a divide as crossing any
national border. All year round, a changing
cast of hikers, bikers, rafters and skiers make
their pilgrimage to the Rocky Mountains.
But before they reach this high-altitude
world, there is a last hurrah of urban life.
The city of Boulder was founded on the
back of a gold rush in 1859, and soon won
the right to host Colorado’s main university.
Since the 1950s, its citizens have also had
the foresight to put aside land for parks, and
to stop their growing city from encrusting
the foothills of the Rockies. These wooded
heights provide Boulder’s backdrop; the
most impressive are the steeply tilted shards
of rock known as the Flatirons. Hiking trails
begin where the houses end, and are much
used by Boulderites. But not so much this
morning. Curtains open to a white-out, with
snow piling up on all flat surfaces at almost
visible pace. The day promises to be one of
indoor comforts, and luckily there are
plenty to be had within trudging distance.
Breakfast comes with a dash of escapism,
first of all to the sultry bayous of Louisiana.
Lucile’s has been serving Creole food in a
butter-yellow Victorian house on 14th Street
for 32 years. As diners on the glassed-in
porch tuck into Cajun-spiced eggs Sardou
or sugar-dusted beignets, a bearded man on
a fat unicycle glides through the snowflakes
outside. Behind him stands the Shambhala- Boulder
There can be few better gateways to the Rockies than this Colorado city – one that
enjoys its outdoors pursuits just as much as its creative restaurants and local brews
Center: a Buddhist retreat of solid Rockies
build, topped by a Far Eastern-style tiled
roof. More outlandish still is the Dushanbe
Teahouse, a gift from Boulder’s sister city,
the capital of faraway Tajikistan. The menu
is eclectic, ranging from Tajik lamb shashlik,
to dishes from Korea, France and Honduras,
but the design is entirely Central Asian in its
painted ceiling and carved plaster panels.
Not all of Boulder’s inspiration comes
from afar, however. Chef Eric Skokan splits
his time between a farm 12 miles out of town
and a pair of restaurants within it: the haute-
cuisine Black Cat and its more everyday
sibling Bramble & Hare, linked by a corridor
at the back. ‘Ninety-eight per cent of the
vegetables we serve are from our farm,’ says
Eric. ‘So is most of the meat. We have a
unique climate here: we get cold air from the
mountains every night, so peas, carrots and
beets do really well.’ Winter is the best time
to catch him in his kitchen, rather than on
the farm. ‘Until the first really big frost
comes along, I often haven’t cooked for two
months,’ he says. Eric appreciates the local
competition: ‘One of the things I love most
about Boulder is the number of places owned
by families. You see the personal touch.’
Boulder was also one of the early centres
of the American craft-brewing revolution of
the 1980s. West Flanders Brewing Company,
in its brick home on Pearl Street, is part of
the current generation, with its patrons
choosing from up to 10 house beers while
listening in to bluegrass jam sessions.
Nine years West Flanders’ senior, the AveryBrewing Company has moved out of its
back-alley premises and into a larger space
on the outskirts. Like other local beer-
makers, Adam Avery benefits from the
snowmelt in the Rockies: ‘You’d have to
be an idiot to make bad beer in Boulder: the
water is so good.’ In 1996, three years into
the business he started with his father, he
brought out the first bottled IPA in Colorado.
‘People then were sending it back, saying
something was wrong with it,’ he recalls.
‘But now people want big flavour.’
A motley army of scents assaults the nose
inside the barrel room, where many of the
beers are to be aged. These casks retain traces
of the wine, bourbon rum or tequila they
once held. ‘When we get a barrel, we build a
beer either to complement it or contrast it,’
says Adam. ‘I love Manhattans, so we went
after a sour rendition of the cocktail:
imperial stout in a bourbon barrel.’ His aim
is to have 3,000 barrels to draw from,
alongside the brewery’s 15 types of hops and
six or more yeast strains. ‘More than half of
the breweries in the US have started in the
last three years,’ says Adam, ‘but Colorado
still has more per head than any state after
Vermont and Oregon. I think there’s an
entrepreneurial spirit here.’Now start your trip into the mountains with a 1-hour
drive north on Route 36 to Estes Park – the gateway
town for Rocky Mountain National Park.Near Boulder’s mountainous western edge,
with views of the Flatirons, the St Julien Hotel
is impeccably urban, but with a Rockies touch in
its elegant dark-wood furnishings, modern four-
poster beds, stone-clad bathrooms and prints of
mountain scenes (from US$234; stjulien.com).
A three-course menu at Bramble & Hare^
costs £19 (brambleandhare.com). The new Avery
brewery has free tours daily (averybrewing.com).
For more trip ideas, see bouldercoloradousa.com.Essentials
Heirloom beetroot, escarole lettuce,
crumbled gorgonzola and walnuts at
Bramble & Hare. RIGHT The Dushanbe
Teahouse’s ornate interior