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In 1864, William Newton Byers, editor and founder of the Rocky Mountain News, used a primitive trail to reach the Longs Peak area. During this trip, Byers met Joel Estes and his family and was so impressed with their pioneer spirit, he named the place Estes Park.

Establishing the Town of Estes Park In the early 1900s, Abner Sprague plotted and surveyed the area, creating the layout that has largely stayed intact to this day.

If you only have one day to visit Estes Park, what should you do? The perfect day in Estes Park includes going on a hike to overlook the town, shopping and eating along Elkhorn Avenue, touring the famous Stanley Hotel, and getting on the water at Estes Lake.

The name “Estes Park” (or “Este's Park” as it was first known), was bestowed on the valley by William Byers, founding editor of the Rocky Mountain News, in honor of its first permanent Anglo residents, Kentuckian Joel Estes and his wife Patsy. Estes Park was founded in 1859 and incorporated in 1917.

Majestic views span in every direction along with the majestic scenes you expect from a Colorado mountain town: gold-medal fishing rivers, iconic peaks, fertile valleys dotted with wildlife plus one unexpected treasure - a national park.

Within this social and economic context, spots like Middle Park and Estes Park, similar to other valleys in the Colorado Rockies, may have served families of Ute, Shoshoni, or Comanche hunters for season after season over hundreds of years.

The town is named after Missouri native Joel Estes, who founded the community in 1859. Estes moved his family there in 1863. One of Estes' early visitors was William Byers, a newspaper editor who wrote of his attempted ascent of Longs Peak in 1864, publicizing the area as a pristine wilderness.

A majestic mountain destination known for outdoor adventure, watchable wildlife and scenic beauty, Estes Park is Colorado's quintessential mountain town.

Are there grizzly bears in Rocky Mountain National Park? No, there are no grizzly bears in Rocky Mountain National Park or the entire state of Colorado, but at one time, there were. The Rocky Mountains of Colorado used to be home to an abundance of grizzly bears until they were declared extinct in Colorado in 1953.