Just like Conde Nast’s “13 Photos of the Most Beautiful Island in the World,” another click-bait article kept circulating throughout the summer of 2015 – The 15 Most Beautiful Spots in Colorado.

Now, lists are subjective and of course beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I get that. But that being said, that article is just plan wrong. It’s a piece that is haphazardly put together by someone who ‘Googled’ (or ‘Pinterested’… is that a thing?) a couple poor quality pictures, didn’t attribute any of them to the photographer, slapped an authoritative title on it to attract clicks, and then paid Facebook for some advertising. And it really, really irritated me…

SO, in no particular order, here are the 15 Most Beautiful Spots in Colorado.

*And by “most beautiful,” I simply mean “better spots that I’ve been to compared to that other terrible list.”*

1. Blue Lakes in the Sneffels Wilderness

2. Piney Lake outside Vail

3. Maroon Lake in the Maroon Bells-Snowmass Wilderness outside of Aspen

4. Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park outside Montrose

5. Ice Lakes Basin near Silverton

6. Ouray, Colorado

7. Mirror Lake in the Indian Peaks Wilderness

8. The Old Crystal Mill in the West Elk Mountains outside Marble

9. The Flat Tops Wilderness

10. Mesa County along the Utah border

11. Colorado National Monument

(Yeah, yeah…. it is “Mesa County” too, but I’m considering it separate…)

12. Crested Butte

13. Great Sand Dunes National Park in the San Luis Valley

14. Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mountain National Park

15. Watching the Sunrise from 14,000+ feet

And there’s still SO much more to see…