Cheyenne Mountain Highway

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Cheyenne Mountain Highway, also known as Cheyenne Mountain Zoo Road and formerly Wonder Road, is a 7.5-mile route in Colorado that climbs about 3,000 feet. It starts at a four-lane interchange in El Paso County near Penrose Boulevard and Old Stage Road. The road is paved up to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo and the Will Rogers Shrine of the Sun; the last four miles to The Horns are unpaved, leading to Broadmoor’s Cloud Camp. There are gates along the way—two after the zoo and a third after the shrine. The Broadmoor maintains the road to help guests reach Cloud Camp.

The road was built in the 1920s by Spencer Penrose to connect his properties on Cheyenne Mountain—the zoo, the shrine, and the mountain top. Civilian Conservation Corps workers built the toll road, at a cost of about $350,000. In 1926 the Cheyenne Mountain Lodge opened at the summit, and visitors could ride elephants up the highway. The Will Rogers Shrine was added in 1937. The Broadmoor ski area operated nearby from 1959 to 1991. A flood in 1965 damaged the highway and it was widened, repaired, and reopened in 1966.

Penrose also started a Broadmoor Cog Railroad to move people between The Broadmoor and the zoo, first opened in 1938. A later train, the Broadmoor Mountaineer, arrived in 1950. From 1961 to 1974 the narrow-gauge cog railway offered a two-mile ride with four tunnels from The Broadmoor to the zoo.