#CHEYENNE MOUNTAIN ZOO PRO#

#CHEYENNE MOUNTAIN ZOO PRO#

PRO TIP: It’s always just a bit cooler at the zoo due to elevation.

Click here to view the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo map.

Last cars allowed up to The Shrine at 3pm and last rides are at 4:30pm.Advance tickets are required to prevent overcrowding in the parking lots and zoo.Before you goĬheck the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo website before you go to make sure you hit the programs you’d like to attend. The deck at The Shrine is located at over 8,000ft elevation and features unparalleled views of Colorado Springs. The Shrine is located within the Zoo boundaries, so you will need zoo admission for each passenger in your car to drive up to The Shrine. The Will Rogers Shrine of the Sun is a monument dedicated to one of Penrose’s best friends who died in plane crash in 1935. Related Reading: Things to do in Colorado Springs The Will Rodgers Shrine to the Sun The Mountaineer Sky Ride will give you a wonderful view of the zoo and Colorado Springs. Cheyenne Mountain Zoo also features virtual experiences, classes and special events like Boo at the Zoo and Electric Safari. The zoo’s summer camp offerings are very popular and usually sell out quickly. The petting zoo in the My Big Backyard exhibit allows kids of all ages to intereact with farm animals like chickens and goats. There are several opportunities throughout the zoo that offer chances for visitors to feed animals like giraffes, rhinos, and elephants. But there are also wonderful programs and activities that allow visitors to get close to the animals. The Cheyenne Mountain Zoo offers a great variety of animal exhibits.

Click here to subscribe to our blog What does the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo offer? The zoo is financed by donations, grants, memberships and admissions and does not receive any support from Colorado Springs tax payers. Shortly beforet Penrose’s death, the zoo was transformed into a nonprofit public trust and made accessible to the people of Colorado Springs and its visitors. The Cheyenne Mountain Zoo was once just the exotic animal collection of successful gold mine owner and Broadmoor founder, Spencer Penrose. The road to the zoo leads you past the Broadmoor Hotel and many high end homes until you end up in the large parking lot of the zoo. Colorado Springs is lucky to have one of the best Zoos in the nation. It is located high above the city on the mountainside in the southwest part of town. Penrose incorporated his zoo in 1938 into a nonprofit public trust “for the sole purpose of establishing and maintaining a zoological park to provide recreation, education, conservation and scientific facilities in the field of zoology and related subjects.The Cheyenne Mountain Zoo is one of the most popular attractions in Colorado Springs. Guests at the luxury hotel weren’t pleased, according to Penrose’s El Pomar Foundation, and in 1926, Penrose founded the zoo and moved his collection to the facility on the flank of Cheyenne Mountain. Many of them were housed in pens and cages in front of and alongside the golf course. He relocated them to his hotel, The Broadmoor, where it was reported that the menagerie, including coyotes, seals and flamingos, roamed the grounds. Soon, an elephant, an elk, fox and deer were at home at Penrose’s Turkey Creek Ranch. In 1916, he was given a black bear and started collecting wild animals. A tall, gregarious Easterner, he made his fortune in investments in real estate and mining and established the Utah Copper Company. Penrose arrived in Colorado Springs in 1892, lured by the promise of gold in nearby Cripple Creek. Spencer Penrose would be pleased by the success of the zoo he established as a nonprofit in 1938.

Cheyenne mountain zoo