Last Updated: July 20, 2026
Dolores is a small but historically rich town tucked into the southwest corner of Colorado at an elevation of about 6,900 feet. Telluride and Durango are roughly an hour’s drive to the east, while Utah’s canyon country begins just to the west. What makes Dolores such a remarkable base is the sheer concentration of world-class archaeological sites within a short drive — Mesa Verde National Park, Canyons of the Ancients National Monument, and Hovenweep National Monument are all within 30 minutes. We last visited southwestern Colorado about two years earlier in the spring, and returning in fall revealed a completely different side of this landscape. The area is steeped in the culture of the Ancestral Puebloans — known historically as the Anasazi — who built some of North America’s most extraordinary stone dwellings here centuries ago.
