Every July, Fairplay races burros over a 13,000-foot pass

Once a year, the small town of Fairplay fills up for a race you have to see to believe: people running long mountain miles tied to a burro by a lead rope, each animal loaded with a pack saddle holding a pick, shovel, and gold pan.

It started in 1949, when, as the organizers tell it, a challenge went out to race a burro from Leadville to Fairplay for a $500 prize. That first year drew 21 entrants, and only 8 finished. The tradition stuck. Today the World Championship Pack Burro Race is the headline event of the three-day Burro Days festival each July.

The long course runs 29-plus miles with an elevation change of 3,232 feet, sending runners and burros up and over Mosquito Pass, which tops out at 13,185 feet, before turning back. A shorter course, about 12.3 miles in recent years, gives more people a way to take part. You cannot ride the burro; you can push, pull, or coax it, but you both finish under your own power.

Around the racing, the weekend packs in a parade, an outhouse race, a llama event, a kids’ pack-dog race, gold panning, music, and food. It draws a big crowd to a tiny town, so dates and parking shift year to year. Confirm the details first at burrodays.org.