Is Royal Gorge Worth It? Bridge, Train, Raft, and Costs

Is Royal Gorge Worth It?

Yes, once, if you pick the right piece. Royal Gorge is four things under one name: the bridge and park, the train, the whitewater, and the free view from the rim. You don’t need all four, and buying all four for a family gets expensive fast.

I live on the west side of Colorado Springs, and Royal Gorge is about an hour’s drive from here. It’s one of the best day trips from the Springs. My tip when people ask: take the train ride through the gorge. It runs along the river on the canyon floor and passes under the bridge, a side of the gorge you can’t get from the rim or the road.

What Each Part Costs and How Long It Takes

How I put this together. Every price, time, and age limit above comes off the operator’s own page: the park’s online ticket store and hours page, the Royal Gorge Route Railroad, and Echo Canyon River Expeditions, an outfitter the park lists on its own site. The bridge time range comes from visitor reviews. The family math is mine. The picks below are my judgment from three columns in that table: age limits, price per person, and how much of the canyon each option shows you. The river photos are mine, shot from along the river, not from a raft. Peak train fares apply to the 12:30 and 6:30 runs, the railroad adds a preservation fee, and dining and tip are extra. Prices move by season, so the booking page has the final number.

Some links here are affiliate links (GetYourGuide, Booking.com, Amazon). If you book or buy through them I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

If You Only Buy One Thing

• First visit, kids 3 and up: park admission and ride the gondola. It’s included and it’s the best view for the money.
• Adults who want the canyon floor: skip the park and take the train. Non-peak Coach is the value seat.
• Everyone 13 and up, summer, good swimmers: the Royal Gorge raft trip. With younger kids, do Bighorn Sheep Canyon instead.
• Tight budget: the free rim trail and Skyline Drive, then lunch in Cañon City.

What a Family of Four Pays

Two adults and two kids 3 to 11: park admission is $149.80 ($39.95 x 2 plus $34.95 x 2). Non-peak Coach on the train adds $426 ($109 x 2 plus $104 x 2). Both comes to about $576 before food, fees, and tip. That’s my math off the posted prices, and it’s why I’d tell most families to pick one.

The Bridge and the Park

Admission covers the walk across the bridge, 956 feet above the Arkansas, and the gondola, which crosses about 1,200 feet up. Ride it at the 10 am opening. The park recommends that hour, before the wind picks up, and wind can shut it down.

Parking is free, RVs included. Shade is scarce, so bring water and a hat. Leashed dogs are allowed. You can’t drive on the bridge, there’s no bungee now, and the incline railway to the river burned in the 2013 fire, so ignore older write-ups that say otherwise. It’s a wooden deck 956 feet over the river, so think hard before bringing toddlers or anyone scared of heights.

Same-day re-entry is free, and a validated ticket gets you back the next day. The gate closes at 5 pm through October 31 and 4 pm from November 1 through early March. See Royal Gorge Bridge and Park tickets and tours.

The Train

If you remember one thing from this page, make it the train. It leaves the Santa Fe Depot in Cañon City, not the bridge park, so treat it as its own stop. Runs go at 9:00, 12:30, and 3:30, plus 6:30 some evenings. Book the 9:00 or 3:30 to get the lower fare. Every class gets the open-air car, so you don’t need Vista Dome just to get outside for photos. If trains are your thing, the Pikes Peak Cog Railway is the other train I’d point you to around here.

Rafting

The Royal Gorge section is serious whitewater, Class III to V. Echo Canyon recommends 13 to 16 as a minimum age and wants good swimmers. A half day covers 10 miles, with about 2 hours on the river. For younger kids, Bighorn Sheep Canyon upstream runs Class I to III for ages 6 and up. My photo above was taken from along the river, not from a raft, but look at those rafters: that stretch is the real thing, not a float.

See the Gorge for Free

Royal Gorge Park, which Cañon City manages around the bridge, has 17-plus miles of trail. The Canyon Rim Trail off County Road 3A has bridge views. Point Alta Vista is the easy one. The Overlook Loop at the Elk Horn picnic area has steep drop-offs, so hold onto kids. Skyline Drive, off Highway 50 on the west edge of Cañon City, is a one-way paved ridge road with no guardrails that looks down on town, the gorge, and the Arkansas valley.

Day Trip or Overnight

The drive is Highway 115 south to US 50 west, then County Road 3A to the gate. That Highway 115 run is in my scenic drives guide. A simple day: get there at opening, do the bridge and gondola while the wind is calm, lunch in Cañon City, then the 3:30 train or the rim trail.

To slow down, book a place in Cañon City for an early gondola or a late train, or stay in Colorado Springs and do it as a day. Fall weekdays are my pick, and my month-by-month guide has the rest. The railroad runs a Holiday Train from mid November through December.

Bring a hat, water, and binoculars for spotting rafters: UV sun hat, insulated 32oz bottle, compact binoculars.

More Springs Guides

• Buena Vista and Salida day trip, farther up the Arkansas
• Weekend getaways from Colorado Springs

Author: Dominic