There are four visitors' centers within the park. Two of the centers and Trail Ridge Road are generally open from late May to mid- October, and are closed because of snow the remainder of the year. Another popular stop is beautiful Bear Lake, which has paved a trail around it and offers a chance to view beaver dams and a high mountain basin lake. Estes Park on the east and Grand Lake on the west are two resort villages, filled with shopping, dining and accommodations. This is an accurate reconstruction of an old adobe fort and trading post as it looked in 1845 when it was an important stop on the Santa Fe Trail.
Visitors park a short walk away from the fort, which is screened from view by an earth wall.
Once past this wall, visitors leave this century and return to the days of the frontier. Costumed interpreters demonstrate what life was like during the days of the mountain men. Visitors are free to walk the fort's ramparts or visit the blacksmith shop, trading post or the trappers' quarters. Other canyons in America are longer or deeper, but no other canyon in North America combines the depth, narrowness, sheerness and the somber countenance of the Black Canyon. A paved road circles the rim of the canyon, offering many thrilling viewpoints over the lip of the canyon, which at some points drops a half-mile.