Last Updated on: 1st May 2025, 10:30 am
Located in Colorado Springs, the Garden of the Gods, a large public park known for its towering sandstone formations, is one of the area’s most popular attractions. Nevertheless, it can be difficult to find practical info on which trails to choose and how to plan out your day. That’s why below, we’ll be covering how to approach the main Garden of the Gods hiking trails for those who want to see as much as possible on foot.
While you’ll find plenty of lists of the top hiking trails, it can be an information overload for those who’ve never been there. But it turns out that many of the trails are actually connected to one another, so you can think of much of the park as one long loop trail with a few optional detours.
All in all, hiking Garden of the Gods is rather easy, and the toughest parts could be considered moderate at best. While we won’t be covering 100% of the trails, it should take a little under three hours to experience the trails featured below.
For more information on reaching Garden of the Gods and where to stay in the area, be sure to check the end of the article.
The Visitor Center
Generally speaking, it often makes sense to start at a park’s Visitor Center. Not only do they often provide useful information, but it’s quite common to find a major trailhead nearby.
But though the Garden of the Gods Visitor Center is indeed worth seeing at some point, it’s far from ideal to use as your main base.
As we’ll cover shortly, your base for the prominent Garden of the Gods hiking trails should be the aptly named Main Parking Lot located further west.
Note that you can, however, take free shuttles from the Visitor Center to various parts of the park during the summer months. Learn more here.
The small museum inside is very well done, and its modern displays feature information about the park’s geology, wildlife, and even the region’s former dinosaur inhabitants.
If there’s any reason to stop at the Visitor Center first thing in the morning, it would be to pick up a physical paper map. Just note that the staff don’t always have enough, and may only give them out to those who seem serious about hiking.
Another good reason to stop here, of course, is for the spectacular views.
While not featured in this guide, just nearby the Visitor Center is the Rock Ledge Ranch Historic Site, which is sort of an outdoor museum.
Though I did try to visit, there didn’t seem to be any staff available, nor was I able to find the most famous building commonly featured in pictures.
Also nearby here is the American Indian Area, which I wouldn’t end up having time to visit.
Navigating the Trails
While not completely essential, it would be helpful to have the AllTrails app handy when navigating Garden of the Gods hiking trails.
In my case, I chose the map labeled ‘Palmer, Cabin Canyon, Strausenbach, and Central Gardens Trail Loop.’ This loop will take you through both the paved and unpaved sections of the park. But if you follow it exactly, you’ll also end up missing a lot.
While the app serves as a helpful reference, those wanting to see all of the geological landmarks will want to take plenty of detours, many of which will be covered below.
The Paved Garden of The Gods Hiking Trails
As mentioned, the park’s Main Parking Lot is the ideal base for hiking through Garden of the Gods. But it fills up fairly quickly. Fortunately, however, you have plenty of other options.
As I’d soon realize, there are lots of little parking lots along the park’s main road. And considering how all the trails around here are connected, you’d be fine parking at a smaller lot and using it as your main base.
Nevertheless, we’ll be covering the highlights assuming you’ve started from the Main Lot. As we’ll cover below, there are also a couple of overlooks and landmarks that are best driven to.
Heading south from the Main Parking Lot, you’ll quickly encounter towering red rock formations on either side of you. Amusingly, when one of the early surveyors first encountered the site, he merely saw it as a good spot for a beer garden.
His companion, however, exclaimed that it was a garden more suited for the gods – hence the park’s name.
One of the first main landmarks you’ll encounter is the Sentinel Spire, a towering formation with a large crack down the middle. It’s comprised of a mix of fine sandstone and shale deposited some 275 million years ago.
Three different paths branch off from the spire, so if you want to fully explore everything, you’ll be coming back here a few different times.
Appropriately, it’s in this general area that you’ll find placards detailing the park’s origins.
This land was purchased in the late 19th century by Charles Elliott Perkins, a friend of General William Jackson Palmer, the founder of Colorado Springs. Luckily for us, Perkins was already a wealthy railroad tycoon and saw no need to develop here.
Instead, he chose to designate it as a public park, with free access to all. And Garden of the Gods remains free to this day.
At the southern end of the paved section of the Garden of the Gods trail is a detour that you don’t want to miss. Known as the Upper Loop Trail, it features some of the park’s most spectacular views, yet it’s not included in the AllTrails route for some reason.
But even if you just have a short time at Garden of the Gods, it’s well worth checking out.
After a short and fairly steep uphill climb, turn around for spectacular views of some of the park’s massive yet thin and flaky outcrops.
Millions of years before Garden of the Gods took on its current appearance, it was at different times a tropical jungle, an inland sea, and a dune field.
The rocks we see today, in fact, are largely comprised of hardened sandstone that used to be part of the dune field. And about 65 million years ago, the rocks were uplifted due to the shifting of tectonic plates.
What followed was many years of erosion, ultimately forming the formations we see today.
Interesting sandstone formations, of course, are abundant throughout neighboring Utah. But one thing that sets Garden of the Gods apart is how green the area is, with the rocks towering over the surrounding dense forest.
The Unpaved Garden of the Gods Hiking Trails
Just west of the main road (Garden Dr) is a long, interconnected series of unpaved trails. Many sections have distinct names and technically count as separate trails. However, I think most first-time visitors would benefit from picturing it as one long trail.
Still, we’ll be naming some individual sections below for clarity.
I wouldn’t end up hiking every single trail here, though I would manage to see most of the geological landmarks before ultimately returning to the Main Parking Lot.
Crossing the road from near the Upper Loop Trail mentioned above, I started by heading along the Strausenbach Trail.
The trail gradually took me uphill, and I got to enjoy some great views of the surroundings from up high. The western section of the park, however, contains fewer sandstone formations overall, and isn’t quite as impressive as the paved section.
A major plus side of the unpaved Garden of the Gods hiking trails is that there are far fewer people in this part of the park. You will, however, find yourself frequently stepping aside to let equestrians pass by.
Another downside to this part of the park is the frequent road crossings. Traffic here is not bad at all, but I find having to repeatedly cross roads can break the immersion of being out in nature.
My first major goal in this part of the park was to see a formation known as the Siamese Twins. I ended up taking the long way as suggested by AllTrails, though I’d recommend most people take the shorter route via the Siamese Twins Trail, as I didn’t encounter much.
Though many of the trails around here don’t have nearly as many people as the paved section of the park, the Siamese Twins is a major exception. But with a bit of patience, I was able to snap an unobstructed shot in between groups of selfie-takers.
Looking back, I realize I would’ve been fine heading directly to this landmark instead of exploring the trails to the west and south of it. But then again, I wasn’t in a major rush.
After the Siamese Twins, I started heading north, largely walking parallel to the main road, Garden Dr. I did, however, take a detour to the other side to see a landmark called The Scottsman. Frankly speaking, it wasn’t really worth the extra effort.
One of the most interesting landmarks in the unpaved part of the park is the Giant Footprint. While I don’t think I spotted the actual footprint, the area features some unique, tilted sandstone monoliths.
Past the Giant Footprint, the path gradually began to take me uphill. Sadly, clouds had formed in the sky and the lighting wasn’t as great as it had been, but this was still one of the most impressive parts of the entire park.
If you don’t have time to walk all of the unpaved trails mentioned above, at least try to walk up the hill to the west of the Main Parking Lot if you can.
Ultimately, I made it back to the parking lot after around 2.5 hours of hiking. But there were still two more landmarks I wanted to see that are best visited by car.
The High Point Overlook
In the southern part of the park is the High Point Overlook, which conveniently has a parking lot right next to it. From the overlook, visitors can enjoy views of the 14,115-foot Pikes Peak, one of the top attractions in the Colorado Springs area.
The other direction, meanwhile, offers an interesting vantage point of more of Garden of the Gods’ iconic sandstone formations – both in the foreground and background.
All in all, this overlook is worth a stop, though still not quite as impressive as some of the views you can see from the trails, in my opinion.
Balanced Rock
Yet another iconic formation of Garden of the Gods is the Balanced Rock. Located in the southwest part of the park, it’s not easily accessed from the main hiking trails, so you’re best off driving there.
Depending on your overall itinerary, you may even want to save it for another day.
Balanced Rock is just as described. It’s a fascinating remnant of what erosion has left behind in this section of the Ancestral Rockies.
It came to be this way due to its bottom layer largely being comprised of relatively soft shale, which eroded more quickly than the sandstone above it.
Notably, visitors to Balanced Rock used to have to pay admission fees in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. But it’s been freely accessible to the public ever since the 1930s.
Additional Info
Garden of the Gods is located right in the small city of Colorado Springs. And another great base for the park would be neighboring Manitou Springs, home to landmarks like the Manitou Incline, Cave of the Winds, and more.
In Colorado Springs, highly-rated mid-range options include Quality Inn & Suites Garden Of The Gods and Home2 Suites.
And those able to splurge a bit more might want to look into Historic Home w/Pikes Peak Views or the Cheyenne Mountain Resort.
Neighboring Manitou Springs is smaller, so many of the centrally located accommodations are motels, such as the Eagle Motel or Villa Motel. The Cliff House at Pikes Peak would also be central enough to walk everywhere.
Garden of the Gods can also be visited as a day trip from Denver. Expect the journey to take you around 90 minutes to 2 hours, depending on traffic and which neighborhood you’re staying in.
I’m far from an expert on Denver. But when researching hotels for my recent trip, I had a very challenging time.
Nearly every time I found a place that seemed to be a good value in a convenient location – whether the city center or suburbs – I encountered numerous reviews complaining of strange individuals loitering in the hallways and parking lots.
In the end, I chose to stay at La Quinta Inn in the southwestern suburbs of Lakewood. This was also convenient for some of the day trips I’d be taking. The area turned out to be fine, though it may not be convenient for those spending multiple days in central Denver.
Whichever place you choose, I would carefully read the reviews, as Denver seems to be going through a rough time at the moment.
There are plenty of additional ways to experience Garden of the Gods beyond what we described above. One way would be to explore the park in a private jeep, which you can do with this highly-rated tour.
If you’re a rock climber wondering if these formations can be climbed, they indeed can be. This rock climbing tour may be what you’re looking for.
As mentioned above, it doesn’t take a whole day to see Garden of the Gods, so you can also combine it with other activities, such as nearby Pikes Peak.