TownofTelluridevacationrentals.

Telluride was founded as a silver-mining camp in 1878, and the grid they laid then is still the grid you walk today. Colorado Avenue runs east to west, the mountains close both ends, and the gondola base sits at the west edge of town near the Society Turn chairlift. The National Historic District designation means the storefronts have not been scraped and replaced; the buildings you photograph in winter are the buildings miners used in 1892.

Staying in Town of Telluride means being inside the life of the place — not behind a gate, not fifteen minutes away. The Telluride Daily Planet is at the newsstand on Colorado Ave. The farmers market sets up in Elks Park on summer Saturdays. The Film Festival takes over the town every September, and for four days you may find yourself sharing a sidewalk with someone who just screened a film you will not see for six months.

The restaurant scene here is compact and unexpectedly serious: 221 South Oak, Rustico, Allred's, Chop House, Brown Dog Pizza for a Thursday night without ceremony. Baked in Telluride has been serving the same breakfast since before most visitors discovered the place. The library on West Colorado Ave is one of the most beautiful small public libraries in the American West.

In winter, the gondola base at the Society Turn is an eight-minute walk from the heart of downtown — ski boots, coffee, and the mountain can all be the same morning. In summer, the Bear Creek trailhead is four blocks from the gondola, and the Jud Wiebe loop starts at the north edge of town.

The box canyon above town — visible from any east-facing window — defines the sky. Bridal Veil Falls is at its eastern end, the highest free-falling waterfall in Colorado. It is the image everyone takes, and rightly, but the canyon itself is the point: a vertical wall of rock that turns the horizon into something the eye cannot flatten.