Why Fruita is dinosaur country

The dry hills around Fruita are full of very old bones. This is not a marketing tagline; it is a documented chapter in the history of paleontology.

In 1901, the scientist Elmer S. Riggs worked the ridges near Fruita and uncovered a skeleton of Apatosaurus at the spot now called Dinosaur Hill. The bones here come from the Morrison Formation, rock layers that stretch across the region and have kept producing finds ever since.

You can stand on this history. Dinosaur Hill, near Fruita, is an interpreted public site with a trail, and the Museums of Western Colorado tell the larger story at the Dinosaur Journey museum in Fruita.

Why care: it explains a lot about the local identity, the road signs, and the steady stream of fossil visitors. It is also a calm, kid-friendly slice of the area’s past.

For the documented discoveries and how to visit the sites responsibly, see the Bureau of Land Management and the Museums of Western Colorado.