Georgetown Days

On the Monday after Thanksgiving, Clear Creek County closes the summit stretch of the Guanella Pass Scenic Byway, and the road traditionally stays shut until the Friday of Memorial Day weekend. Its reopening begins Georgetown Days, the Town of Georgetown’s run of events at the end of May that honor veterans and open the summer season. The town’s own page tells drivers to go up to Guanella Pass Summit and photograph Mount Bierstadt, which it calls “rapidly unthawing” at that time of year. It also warns that the highway’s opening day and time are subject to change.

Pancakes and a ribbon in Library Park

In 2025 the Friday fell on May 23. Pancakes in the Park ran from 9:00 to 10:00 in the morning at Library Park. For $6, the town’s announcement offered breakfast “with our paw-some mayor” and a chance at a photograph with first responders. Leashed, friendly dogs were invited. All proceeds went to the Clear Creek County Veterans Coalition. Around 10 o’clock Georgetown’s Police Judge and other honorary guests cut the ribbon for the byway, and the road over the pass was open for another season.

Saturday: the Hotel de Paris and Mountain Jams

On the Saturday, May 24 in 2025, the Hotel de Paris Museum begins its daily tours. The building holds thousands of historic artifacts original to it. It is a Site of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and is owned and operated by The National Society of The Colonial Dames of America in the State of Colorado. Children six and under go in free, and so do residents of the Georgetown-Silver Plume National Historic Landmark District.

That afternoon, from 2:00 to 3:30, the Mountain Jams concert plays in Library Park in the historic district. It opens a summer of live music put on by the Friends of the Georgetown Library, the Town of Georgetown, and the Georgetown Cultural Arts Program.

Sunday is Georgetown Business Day. The town describes the weekend as the time when Georgetown “fills with new life after its long winter slumber,” and its residents and shopkeepers mark the occasion. On Memorial Day itself the town holds a Memorial Ceremony in Library Park, downtown, for the men and women who died serving in the U.S. military. Veterans are asked to wear the uniform of their branch. Others may wear a red poppy.

Miners on foot

The Saturday also holds the event the weekend is best known for. The Georgetown Pack Burro Race starts at 11 a.m. in the streets of town, and its runners go on foot beside their animals. The program lists a “Call to Doo-ty” (Poop drop) alongside it. The race’s own website carries the slogan “Run your ass off.” Brad Wann directs it, along with the pack burro race in Idaho Springs. In 2026 Idaho Springs held its 25th annual race the next day, Sunday, May 24.

The town and the race site give the same account of where the race comes from. In the early mining days, prospectors walked their burros (burro is Spanish for donkey) through the Colorado mountains. The animals carried the supplies, so the miners could not ride them and walked ahead, leading them. The race site also passes on two legends. In one, two miners found gold at the same spot at the same moment and raced back to town to reach the claims office first, running because the burros were too small or too loaded down to ride. The other, which the site calls “somewhat vague,” involves a few drunken miners at a bar in Leadville. The site, citing Wikipedia, says that in 2012 pack burro racing was recognized as Colorado’s official summer heritage sport.

The course has changed. The town’s 2025 page called the race 8 miles. An older listing on the race site, for a 14th annual race, describes about 8 to 9 miles from Georgetown to Empire and back. That listing told runners to follow the traffic pattern around the roundabout, yield to downhill runners, and check themselves for ticks afterward, and it offered a prize to whoever picked up the most trash on the course. In 2025 the Union/Empire Pass Trail washed out. The 22nd annual race, on Saturday, May 23, 2026, ran a new 6-mile course past the Capital Prize Gold Mine, Georgetown Lake, and the 1883 Saxon Mountain Trail.