Colorado Mountain School

Our Story

Who we are

The mountains have a profound ability to make us feel alive. Colorado Mountain School exists to share the power of the mountains with adventurers who want to learn and explore. We are more than a collective of guides. We’re a family of top-notch educators and mentors who care about your progression in the mountains, and in life. We’re dedicated to experiences that are educational, fun, challenging, and life-changing at times. We’re your partners who push you to go a little higher and a little farther—purely for the joy of discovering what’s over the next ridge. Colorado Mountain School was founded in Estes Park, Colorado in 1981. Since then we’ve built a reputation on tens of thousands of days skiing, climbing, mountaineering, and teaching in our backyard—the spectacular Colorado Rockies—and across the globe in other world-class mountain ranges. Our team is highly trained and curates internationally respected courses and trips. CMS is Colorado’s largest mountain guide company, an accredited guide service of the American Mountain Guides Association, and the country’s #1 AIARE avalanche course provider. We believe… that what you accomplish is less important than how you accomplish it. As a result, we are industry leaders in:

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Protect yourself and your partner in an emergency. Prepare yourself and avoid the dreaded epic!

This comprehensive rock rescue course will teach you basic rescue skills while climbing, so you can prevent a full-blown emergency. For anyone who climbs outdoors, this course is mandatory.

Team video

This course, in Vedauwoo, Wyoming — the offwidth capital of the world, teaches basic and advanced offwidth climbing techniques that will have you cruising wide cracks in style.

Don’t learn to avoid wide cracks, learn to conquer them! Offwidth cracks are too narrow to fit your whole body in and too wide to use standard crack climbing techniques.  Since the cracks are unique in size, the climbing can seem awkward.  This course, in the offwidth capital of the world, will teach you basic and advanced offwidth climbing techniques that will have you cruising wide cracks in style.

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Highlights

Some Adventure Options

Mountaineering Development Series: Level 1

Mountaineering Development Series: Level 1 is an immersive 5-day course teaches students how to climb mountains in any condition – from tying your first knot, to standing on your first summit, this course is sure to take you to new heights.

The five-day Mountaineering Development Series course is the perfect introduction to mountaineering. Don’t let the winter months keep you inside. With plenty of climbing and skills work, individuals will learn the basic of mountaineering. Start with snow travel skills – such as travelling as a roped team,  techniques for walking in crampons, using a mountaineering axe properly and self-arresting a fall. – and end the course doing a big mountaineering route in Rocky Mountain National Park. This course is a great first step towards winter ascents, glaciated peaks, and expeditions.

Rock Rescue

Protect yourself and your partner in an emergency. Prepare yourself and avoid the dreaded epic!

This comprehensive rock rescue course will teach you basic rescue skills while climbing, so you can prevent a full-blown emergency. For anyone who climbs outdoors, this course is mandatory.

Top Rope Climbing Anchors

This beginner/intermediate level class teaches climbers how to set simple, solid top rope climbing anchors for outdoor rock climbing.

In this course, our instructors will teach fundamental anchoring principles in a ground school setting and then quickly transition to using those skills to establish toprope setups for a small group.  From the top of climb, participants will learn to position their climbing rope in the best place to facilitate a rock climb, and they will learn how to use a series of tethers and backups to be secure in the process.  If you are just getting in to rock climbing and looking for more independence, these skills are vital to making your first trips out on your ow

Offwidth In Vedauwoo

This course, in Vedauwoo, Wyoming — the offwidth capital of the world, teaches basic and advanced offwidth climbing techniques that will have you cruising wide cracks in style.

Don’t learn to avoid wide cracks, learn to conquer them! Offwidth cracks are too narrow to fit your whole body in and too wide to use standard crack climbing techniques.  Since the cracks are unique in size, the climbing can seem awkward.  This course, in the offwidth capital of the world, will teach you basic and advanced offwidth climbing techniques that will have you cruising wide cracks in style.

what they offer

Avalanche Safety
Backcountry/XC
Ice Climbing
Mountaineering
Rock climbing

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What people are saying

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Contact Details

Email

info@coloradomountainschool.com

Call us

720-387-8944