Pikes Peak Plus Pass
Pikes Peak Country Attraction members have come together to create a sophisticated, yet easier than ever way for people to visit the Pikes Peak region. Pikes Peak Plus Pass is an easier and more affordable way for people to buy their attractions and activities tickets. The pass gives people the ability to purchase attractions and activities tickets online at discounted prices, and serve as their one-stop-shop pass to as many attractions as they would like. No more waiting in lines to buy attractions and activities tickets, or printing coupons that you have to clip and save. With just a few clicks of the mouse, you’ll have all your activities and attractions tickets purchased and plans made for you and your whole family.

New HD Film of the Garden of the Gods – You’ve Never Seen the
Garden Look Like This!
“How Did Those Red Rocks Get There?” is a brand-new movie at the Garden of the Gods Visitor and Nature Center which dramatically captures the formation of the Garden of the Gods Park as it has never been seen before. The movie features state-of-the-art technology that is one of the first theaters in the United States to utilize BluRay High Definition technology for playback and projection. A massive 23 ft. screen vividly displays the historic, geographic and geological story of the Garden of the Gods Park. The Center’s theater presentation combines High Definition technology, theatrical lighting, and a surround sound audio system to dynamically present the story of the Garden of the Gods.

In eight days of principle photography, Garden of the Gods was captured with a series of helicopter aerial views, time-lapsed sequences and footage of seldom explored, remote locations. Utilizing the Sony “CineAlta” – a top-of-the-line High Definition 1080P Camera – to capture all imagery, the footage was then edited and mastered to stunning 1080P High Definition to ensure the highest resolution of the images.

A One-of-a Kind Find at the Garden of the Gods
On May 24, 2008, the Garden of the Gods Visitor & Nature Center announced the discovery of an entirely new and quite remarkable find. Dr. Kenneth Carpenter, curator of lower vertebrate paleontology at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. Dr. Carpenter, who is known for his work in re-examining dinosaur fossils using the latest forensic technology, announced the world’s only known fossil of an entirely new dinosaur species, Theiophytalia kerri. Theios is of Greek origin, meaning “belonging to the gods” and phytalia means “garden.” Kerri honors the name of the scientist who first discovered this 125 million year old skull in Garden of the Gods Park.

In 1878, Professor James H. Kerr of Colorado College discovered what he believed to be “portions of 21 different sea monsters” in “one of the ridges east of the red rocks of the Garden of the Gods” Park. Kerr wrote of his discovery to associates back east which caught the attention of O.C. Marsh, the famous dinosaur paleontologist from Yale University. In 1886, Marsh came to Colorado Springs and obtained the fossil skull, identified it as a Camptosaurus dinosaur, and shipped it to the Peabody Museum in New Haven, Connecticut.

For one hundred and seventeen years, Dr. Kerr’s dinosaur fossil was forgotten. In 1994, the new Garden of the Gods Visitor Center was under construction. When geology exhibits were being created for the center, the Denver Museum of Nature & Science was consulted about a dinosaur exhibit. Dr. Kirk Johnson and Dr. Ken Carpenter surprised the city park staff with information about the Camptosaurus skull found in the Park.

Kirk Johnson hand carried the dinosaur fossil from Yale to Denver so that Ken Carpenter could study the ancient dinosaur skull and make a precise replica (cast) of it. In 1997, the Denver Museum of Nature & Science gave a cast of the Camptosaurus skull to the City of Colorado Springs to be exhibited in Garden of Gods Visitor & Nature Center. It was a rare gift, with an ancient and modern story, but the surprise ending was yet to come.

For more than ten years, the dinosaur known as “Campi” had been part of the Jurassic exhibit. But, from the time he made the replica, Dr. Carpenter had his doubts about this dinosaur’s true identity. In 2006, Dr. Carpenter along with his associate, Kathleen Brill, published a paper – A Description of a New Ornithopod from the Lytle Member of the Purgatoire Formation (Lower Cretaceous) and a Reassessment of the Skull of Camptosaurus – that resolved irregularities in the attributes of that skull and its camptosaur heritage – the shape and length of the skull and snout, and the position and shape of nasal and eye-socket openings. Those variations, plus issues with the soils originally embedded around the fossil, have resulted in the designation of the first and only Theiophytalia kerri.

The new Cretaceous age Theiophytalia Kerri is thus determined to be a new species of dinosaur, the only one known in the world and “belonging to Garden of the Gods.”