Aerial Overview

North and South Table Mountain dominate this scene, with Clear Creek running eastward between them. Golden is nestled to their right, up against the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The snakelike feature to the south, between the Front Range and Green Mountain at upper left, is Dakota/Dinosaur Ridge. Interstate 70 cuts through the ridge's northern tip at the "Point of Geologic Interest" or POGI site. Beyond the ridge, lost in haze, is Red Rocks Park in the Front Range. This photo tour visits the Clear Creek canyon, Triceratops Trail in Golden, the POGI site, the Dinosaur Ridge fossil track site, Red Rocks and the roadcut in the Turkey Creek water gap south of Morrison.

The Front Range has risen three times. The first two ranges, dating from the Pennsylvanian Period (about 300 million years ago) and the Cretaceous/Tertiary Periods (70 to 45 Ma), were erased by millions of years of erosion. Today's Front Range, along with the rest of the Rockies, began its growth in the Miocene Epoch starting about 25 Ma. All this activity tilted and folded the older rocks while creating large deposits of sedimentary rocks—the Denver basin—in the lands to the east. Today the Denver basin produces oil and gas while older Colorado rocks yield coal of high quality.

Early gold miners plied their trade in Clear Creek, following the placers into the mountains during the Colorado gold rush. Coal was later mined in Golden, then clay for the brickmakers of Denver. Uranium and other metals also came from the Rockies for many years, but today Colorado has relatively few active mines. The largest industry in Golden today is the mighty Coors brewery, in the canyon of Clear Creek between North and South Table Mountains.