We’re up in Breckenridge to enjoy a long relaxing weekend so we had to see the troll that everyone’s talking about. If you haven’t heard, there is a new art installation in Breckenridge commissioned by the Breckenridge International Festival of Arts. The sculpture is a 15 foot tall troll named Isak Heartstone. Isak is made out of scrap lumber and downed trees that was created by the Danish artist Thomas Dambo.
We wanted to go see it while we’re here in town for a long weekend, so we decided Friday was a good time to go before the weekend crowd descends on the town.
On Friday after breakfast, we headed down to town and made a few stops along the way.
Our first stop was in the Breckenridge Welcome Center. This is a great place to start you visit in town because they know everything going on and have tickets to most of the events. We purchased our Dining Passport, which gives you discounts at many of the local restaurants during the fall season. We also purchased our tickets for the Still on the Hill Crafts Spirits Festival. Unfortunately, they were having a printing issue so the lady working there asked us to come back later. They also had a little flyer giving directions to get to Isak the troll.
From there we went stopped in a few shops and ended up missing the purple bus at the South Gondola Lot that takes you to see Isak. Since the bus meanders around town we watched it on the My Free Ride app and made our way up Lincoln Ave to catch the bus on French Street.
The bus drops you off very close to the Isak sculpture so there isn’t much of a hike on the Wellington Trail. Once the driver lets you off the bus, you’ll see signs directing you to the troll. Follow the flat trail through the rock formations and you’ll be there in about 5 to 10 minutes.
There is one more thing to add: there are houses very near the troll so please be respectful of the neighbors.
There is some controversy about this large art installation by some local neighbors. Until I saw Isak in person, I didn’t realize what the fuss was all about. It turns out the location for Isak’s installation is right next to a neighborhood. The reason to point this out is to encourage you to visit Isak sooner, rather than later, in case changes are made to him. You can read more about this in the Summit Daily article “Feeling trolled, Breckenridge residents want popular, wooden sculpture removed.”
The sculpture will remain in place as long as it can stay intact.
Here are some links for more information:
How to Find the Breckenridge Troll
If you want to see Isak in person and need a place to stay, please check the availability of our condo. While we use it as much as we can, we make it available when it’s not in use.