Trinidad Lake State Park
Day-use fee or Colorado state park pass required.
The U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers built the dam that created
Trinidad Lake as an irrigation and flood-control project in
1978.
The park has been managed by Colorado State Parks since 1980.
Take a minute at the overlook and think about the six small
communities that were once located in the Purgatoire River Valley
that is now covered by the lake. Each of these small communities
evolved from old coal mining camps. An occasional mine entrance
(most sealed by the lake) and tailings still exist as evidence of
the industry that once flourished here, when "coal was king."