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The Creek ~ Cripple Creek, Colorado


First visit: Oct 2025

A week ago Friday, Mrs. RJG and I decided to take a mountain drive and take in the beautiful Fall colors of the Aspen trees. As we gradually ascended from Woodland Park to Cripple Creek, the trees were as golden yellow as I've ever seen in my life. Blue skies, cool weather, and bright yellow trees. What a site to behold. Traffic was slow, which was great, so I could also enjoy the scenery as the driver. We agreed then that we must take this drive every year around this time.

Though we've been to Cripple Creek a few times over the years, we've never stopped to do anything. They legalized gambling here in 1991, but that didn't matter to me when I first arrived in 1993. Neither of us are into gambling, so it's just a matter of stopping and finding things to do. You know, like thrifting and eating. Which is exactly what we did. They have a nice thrift store BTW.

The highest rated restaurant in town is The Creek. Looked like the perfect spot for us. They open at 11, so we ensured we ate something before leaving the house. The timing was perfect. As we walked in, there was a sign informing us that they were short staffed (common theme here) so service might be slow. Didn't matter to us, as we had nowhere else to go but back to Woodland Park for more thrifting. The restaurant sits in one of the authentic older structures still standing. A darkened restaurant with great views outside the front windows.

As it turns out, service wasn't slow. We ordered a couple of beers, and I went for the cheeseburger, while Mrs. RJG tried the Mushroom Swiss burger. We each got fries. Simple order, simple meal. And it was delicious and the meal came out steaming hot. Really, really great tasting burgers. It's not hard, so you wonder why so few get it right. No matter, as not only are we making the drive annually, we're coming back to The Creek to wrap up a perfect day trip.

10/3/25 (new entry)

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