According to Wikipedia "Bishop Castle is an "elaborate and intricate" "one-man project" named after its constructor, Jim Bishop, that has become a roadside attraction in central Colorado."
This information is on the official website for Bishop's Castle:
"For nearly 60 years, Jim Bishop has been constructing one of the most impressive monuments to perseverance in Colorado. Bishop castle is a monumental statue in stone and iron that cries loud testament to the beauty and glory of not only Having a Dream, but Sticking with your Dream no matter what, and most importantly, that if you do believe in yourself and strive to maintain that belief, anything can happen! Three full stories of interior rooms complete with a Grand Ballroom, soaring towers and bridges with vistas of a hundred miles, and a Fire-Breathing Dragon make the Bishop Castle quite the unforgettable experience! Visitors are always welcome free of charge, and the castle itself is always open."
I ran across information on it just because I was looking online for what to see and do. This really seemed pretty weird to us but we decided we had to see it. It was a bit of a drive too through the mountains, but it was worth it. This has to be the most unusual work in progress that we've ever seen.
There is no information anywhere else around Rye or the surrounding towns about this place. It seems the native people don't want this to be somewhere tourists explore. The nearby Chambers and Tourist Information places had nothing to show us on it. We found this very interesting.
Anyway, off we went with our information from the Bishop's Castle website. The countryside on the way their was beautiful. However, on a couple of occasions we met vehicles coming the other way and we had to pull over off the road next to a mountainside. That was not my cup of tea! But Lee got us there in one piece.
When the website said that the castle was right off the road, we didn't know it meant that literally. It really was right off the road.
Lots of Warnings!!
You walk through this gate to enter although you could just walk around it.
Here I am standing in front of the castle which is a work still in progress as you can plainly see! You can also see all the steps and walkways going up and around the building.
There are tons of steps to climb inside, outside or even above the roof! We played it safe and only climbed those on the inside.
Notice all the walkways at the very top of the building. There were quite a few people here today and we didn't see anyone take any of those walkways! LOL
The first floor is nothing spectacular at this point. It has a wooden floor though which we appreciated after climbing all kinds of steps of wire mesh material.
There are quite a few stained glass windows in the castle although none of them could be compared to church stained glass windows. These are on the second level in the castle.
Here I am looking out on the grounds from the second floor. If I walked through the windows area to the outside, I would be standing on wire mesh. You can see the ground below when standing on it.
Here is a picture of what all the outside walkways and steps are made of.
There are some walkways that have ropes to keeps you from going out but there are stairways to heaven that are free to climb if you want. We didn't!
The view is beautiful from this window but from most areas, you look down on construction zone areas.
The small building below is now their Gift Shop. The original Gift Shop was destroyed in a fire.
As you can see there is really no roof over this castle, as such. Therefore, the rain can come in and flood the wooden floors.
Around each floor, there is always the wire mesh flooring so that you can walk around the outside of the Castle and you can take steps to the next level from the inside or outside.
This is looking up at a staircase we walked up on.
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Here is a look at the staircase from this point of view.
Some Construction Equipment below
We really enjoyed wandering around. You don't see this kind of thing very often in your life. He has been working on this for 60 years now and we aren't sure that it won't take another 60 to get it done. Hope not for his sake. But from walking around on the wire mesh and seeing all the patch work on it already, we aren't sure how long this will last after it is finished.
We enjoyed a beautiful sunset on the way back to the camper.
We stayed at Colorado City, Pueblo South KOA.
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