Ice Castles cancel both Colorado locations for 2026-27 season
Oct 19, 2026, 11:06 PM
Earlier this month, Colorado lost its Ice Castles in Cripple Creek. Now Silverthorne is out too. The company behind the frozen attraction announced Oct. 14 that it won’t run either Colorado location for the 2026-27 winter season. For the first time in years, the state won’t have a single Ice Castle.
Cripple Creek officials said last winter’s mild weather hurt Ice Castles at sites across the country, so the company is opening fewer of them this season. Teller County’s “significant water issues” also played a role. Colorado came off one of its worst snow years on record. That’s a problem when your whole business depends on growing thousands of icicles every day. The company says it hopes to come back to Colorado “in the future.” For now, the only confirmed Ice Castles location is in North Woodstock, New Hampshire, which is a long drive for a slide made of ice.
You can still see some impressive ice this winter without leaving the metro. ice! at Gaylord Rockies returns Nov. 20 and runs through Jan. 3. This year it’s built around Disney’s “Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas,” with huge hand-carved ice sculptures inside the Aurora resort. The best part: it’s indoors, so the weather can’t melt it. The resort’s Christmas lineup also includes indoor snow tubing on Candy Cane Mountain, a Christmas carousel and gingerbread decorating. Tubing and the carousel run Nov. 26 through Dec. 28.
Bring a heavy coat even though it’s indoors. The ice! area is kept well below freezing so the sculptures stay solid, and the resort hands out parkas. Ice! has sold out in past years, so book a date early, especially for the weeks right before Christmas. Ice Castles may be gone for now, but Gaylord Rockies still has plenty of ice.
