Walk into the Visitors Center in Georgetown, Colorado and you'll see a banner that reads, "The Train Will Operate Next Year - Colorado Historical Society."
Just down the road, there's a banner straddling the street that reads, "Show Me The Steam Train." It was put there by a group called the Colorado Historic Railroad Preservation Association.
The banners are a symbol of the bad blood and anxiety surrounding the fate of the Georgetown Steam Train, one of the region's top tourist attractions and the bread-and-butter for many of the town's merchants.
The state Historical Society and the private Georgetown Loop Railroad rebuilt and operated the railroad. But it became an increasingly tense relationship over the years, said Rosa Ashby, one of the railroad's founders.
Rosa said her family worked for decades to improve the railroad and many folks around here say the family's done a very good job. But Rosa said the state's bureaucracy prompted the family to call it quits.
When the last train pulls into the station on Oct. 3, the railroad will shut down for the season - and the Ashbys will leave for good. They'll take their trains with them, too.
"You know there will be tears," Rosa said. But she offered no apologies for her family's decision not to continue with the operation.
"Here's the way I put it," she said. "I'm sad that 30 years has to end this way. I'm mad because I feel that the Historical Society is a bureaucracy that hasn't really cooperated with us. And I'm glad that we've given it our best."
The state owns the land and the railroad owns and runs the trains. When the original contract expired last year, negotiations collapsed.
"It's a shame," said Bob Bowland of nearby Idaho Springs. "Both parties are really sincere, but they're coming at it from worlds apart."
The railroad claims it was given a take-it-or-leave-it proposal. A Historical Society spokeswoman referred us to the society's website which said the negotiations included insurance, parking, water storage and other issues. Insurance was a big issue, some local residents said.
[Notes]
Georgianna Contiguglia, president of the Colorado Historical Society, said the society tried to negotiate with the railroad and gave ground on several important issues. Some of the terms, like increasing the level of insurance, were required by the state. The railroad carried only $1 million worth of insurance, she said.
"We reached a point where we said this is what we can do and what we can't do," she said. The railroad walked away from the proposal, she said.
At that point, the society had to seek bids or risk not having the trains in operation in 2005. Once the bid process started, the state could not negotiate with anyone, she said.
She said she's confident the train will run next year - and she expects it to be a steam train.
The society noted that the state has invested more than $900,000 in the site, which includes the Silver Plume mine, in the past six years.
The state decided to seek bids for a new contract.
The railroad owners were offended that they would have to reapply for contract - they would even have to tour the site like newcomers.
"We've been doing this for 30 years. They know how we run the business," said Rosa, whose family also runs the Royal Gorge railroad near Canyon City, Colorado.
The customers certainly seemed happy when we visited.
 A narrow gauge steam train named the Georgetown Loop Railroad carries passengers over the reconstructed Devils Gate High Bridge. The train travels through mining country between Georgetown and Idaho Springs, CO.
At the Devil's Gate station, they cheer as the conductor yells "BOARD!" and ten red cars start up the steep slope to Silver Plume. Almost immediately they cross the landmark curved bridge over Clear Creek, far below. The curve is so sharp passengers still on the bridge can see the engine as it chug-chugs up the hill, spewing and hissing white steam.
"I just thought it was a hoot. I loved seeing the smoke against the golden aspen," said passenger Patty Hunter.
Bowland said Rosa's family ran "a first-class operation" and the state won't be able to match it immediately. But he added that he's optimistic about the long-term future of the railroad.
"It won't be seamless, it will take time. But the state is working very hard to make sure it works well," he said.
Bowland, who was on the state-appointed committee that evaluated the proposals, said Rosa's family should have submitted a proposal.
"I think they were afraid they wouldn't get a fair shake, but I can tell you everything was fair and unbiased. They would have won the bid by a mile," he said. The Denver Post reported that there was only one acceptable bid.
Now it's a lose-lose situation - and Georgetown merchants have the most to lose. The railroad is, by far, the town's biggest moneymaker.
If the new operator doesn't make a go of it, the town could whither.
"It's a shame," Bowland said. "Both parties are really sincere, but they're coming at it from worlds apart."
Some of the railroad workers are bitter. Conductor Ryan Davis said the state escalated the feud by pressing charges against a worker who took home a discarded sign.
[Notes]
Re: Pressing Charges
Georgianna, who is also the historical society's chief executive officer, said the society's signs announcing that the railroad will operate next year had been repeatedly vandalized over the summer. When one sign and it's stand were missing, the society reported the possible theft to police.
The police investigation determined who took the sign and from there it was a police matter, she said.
That incident, and others, told her how much bad blood existed. She said society staff members have been harassed and her office has received offensive messages.
"I'm quite dumbfounded there's such animosity." she said. She promised that the society
will work hard to improve the relationship with the community in the coming years.]
"I won't work for the Historical Society," he said. He added that the new owners will find out that working with a steam engine... is an art.
"It's alive. It has a personality. It's the closest thing to a wild horse," he said, adding that no two days are the same with a steam engine.
Of course, that sense of a living machine is what attracts so many visitors to the short, steep ride between Georgetown and Silver Plume.
The state insists that the railroad will run next year, but no one is saying it will have a steam engine - and you can be sure Rosa's family won't sell theirs to the new operators.
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SILVER STREETS, MINING TOWNS
You've heard of places where the streets were paved with gold and silver. They're myths, of course, except in Georgetown, Colorado, where the streets really were made of silver - until people realized what they were walking on.
 Thomas Curtis, an ex-miner and tour guide explains the area of the Lebanon Silver Mine in Georgetown, CO called the hoist room. The hoist shown in the foreground would have been attached to a small cage - which would raise and lower the miners to different horizontal shafts.
Back in 1850s miners obsessed with finding gold tossed away tons of ore loaded with silver.
"They were getting pennies of gold and throwing away dollars of silver," said Tom Curtis, a former miner who now lives in the mountains near Georgetown. They had so much ore they didn't know what to do with it.
You can imagine them talking about it.
"Hey Zeke, we gotta git rid of this black stuff somehow. It's getting' in the way."
"Well, Rufus, why don't make it into roads. It ain't good for nothin' else."
And that's what they did.
Later, an assayer said the streets were paved with argentiferous galena: lead with a high silver content. The folks of Georgetown were walking on a fortune.
"It took maybe a day or two for them to pull those streets up. Everyone who could get some of it, did," said Tom, who has a gray-brown beard and a red face that says he's spent a lot of time outdoors since his mining days.
Tom mined until his legs and back gave out. He was happy to leave the business.
"Nothing is spookier than watching the light disappear from the end of a tunnel. I've been in one of those (cave-ins). If I'm never in another one, that will be too soon."
Even so, Tom still goes underground as a guide at the Silver Plume mine west of Georgetown. Just can't get it out of his blood, he said.
The Georgetown discovery was the start of the great Colorado silver boom. Georgetown became the Silver Queen of the West.
The high Rockies, west of Denver, are dotted with former mining towns. Places like Georgetown, Idaho Springs, and Leadville sprang up almost as soon as someone shouted "Gold!"
In the 1890s, the Argo Tunnel in Idaho Springs connected more than 50 mines, some of them as far away as Central City.
A prospector's work was just beginning when he spotted gold in a riverbed. To find the vein, he had to follow the trail of gold upriver in search of the vein. Usually it was on a mountainside, far above the river.
"They were pretty good geologists, they knew what the minerals meant," said Bob Bowland, former president of the Idaho Springs Historical Society.
Then they had to mine the site, separate the gold from the ore and transport it. It was risky and dangerous. These guys scaled cliffs a donkey wouldn't climb, then spent their days inside a homemade cave.
Later, bigger mines produced more than $200 million (in 1890s money) in precious metals but most of them are closed now except for tours. It costs more to extract gold and sliver than it's worth. Today, gold sells for about $400 an ounce.
But there are still plenty of small-scale gold-seekers around. Walk into the hardware store in Idaho Springs and you'll find prospecting equipment, right there with cell phones and electronics.
More than a century after the Silver Plume closed, you can still see people panning in Clear Creek, which runs through many of the mining towns.
"The gravel in that stream has been pretty well worked over, but people still find a little color (gold) there," said Bowland said.
Most of these modern prospectors are in it for fun. But Ken Reid, a 41-year-old Denver native, is looking to make money.
He once found nearly 10 ounces of gold in one day in California. His best day in Colorado was 31/2 ounces.
"I've been at it 30 years, so I can brag about a few good days," he said. Ken says he does it for the adventure as well as the money. But he has a word of caution for those folks buying their first prospector's gear.
"My advice is: Don't do it. It's addictive."
Many of the towns flourished with mining and railroads then faded when the mines closed. Silver Plume, where miners formed some of the best bands in the state, now has just a couple of stores.
 The Maude Monroe Mine, located on the bank of Clear Creek in Idaho Springs, is one of many old mining mills that still exists throughout the Rockies west of Denver.
In the past half-century, other communities - like Dillon, Breckenridge, Idaho Springs, and Frisco and Georgetown - were revived by skiing and tourism. Most of them are quaint villages lined with modern shops to capture a tourist's heart.
Dillon has about 800 full-time residents, but swells to 4,000 in winter and summer. Frisco (on the other side of Lake Dillon) has 2,500 year-rounders, but peaks at nearly 35,000 in the winter. Breckenridge grows from 2,000 to 45,000.
Lindsey Arnold, a 23-year-old Florida native, is part of an army of young people who come to the high country to ski, snowboard or hike. There's plenty of work for them in season but in October and April, everyone's out of a job, she said.
 Lindsey Arnold - a tour guide at the County Boy Mine - displays how miners used the jack-leg, which combines air compression and water to drill into rock. The County Boy Mine was primarily a gold mine located in Breckenridge, CO.
On the ski slopes, you can tell the locals from the tourists pretty quickly, Lindsey said. The locals are the ones with patches of duct tape. They can't afford to buy new ski clothes every time something gets ripped, she said.
Most newcomers leave within five years, said Flo Raitano, former mayor of Dillon - which is 9,000 feet above sea level. There's snow 12 months a year.
"We watch Fourth of July fireworks in the snow. It takes a certain kind of person to live here," she said. But those that stay love, she said.
Flo and her husband (Ben, the mayor pro tem) have been here nearly 15 years. That makes them old-timers.
DILLON
There are three towns under Lake Dillon's cool green waters -- and they're all Dillon.
The town was founded in 1873, but moved twice a decade later, first to be next to the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad and later to be near the Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad. The fourth move came when Denver created the lake as a reservoir in the 1960s.
Today, the lake is a tourist mecca dotted with sailboats and surrounded by evergreen-covered hills. Beyond the hills, gray mountains loom in all directions.
You'll find hikers and bikers on the paths that circle the lake and connect the lakeside towns. In fact, the entire area is a web of bike paths, some of them through absolutely gorgeous mountainsides and valleys.
The path up Vail Pass travels through an alpine valley - rich with flowers, aspen, canyon walls and rippling stream waters.
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