From La Junta, an interesting quick detour off US-50, Hwy-194 runs along the north bank of the Arkansas River to one of Colorado’s most evocative historic sites, Bent’s Old Fort (daily; $3; 719/383-5010). It lies eight miles east of La Junta, or 15 miles west of Las Animas. From 1833, when it was built by the fur-traders William and Charles Bent, until 1848, when war with Mexico and increasing unrest among the local Arapahoe, Apache, and Cheyenne tribes put an end to their business, Bent’s Fort was the Southwest’s most important outpost of American civilization, and a stopping place for travelers, trappers, and explorers including John C. Fremont, Francis Parkman, and just about every other Wild West luminary.
Though it was abandoned and left to decay for over 100 years, the large adobe fort was authentically rebuilt by the National Park Service in 1976, and now stands as a palpable reminder of the early years of the frontier era. Thick adobe walls, 15 feet tall with circular bastions at the corners, protect a roughly 100-square-foot compound. Rangers dressed in period clothing work as wheelsmiths, coopers, and carpenters, or process the many buffalo robes and beaver pelts piled up in storerooms.
