Manitou Springs “Penny Arcade”

It’s on the list of Cheap Things To Do In The Springs, but until last weekend, we’d never been to Arcade Amusements in Manitou.  That’s the official name, but I’ve never heard it referred to as anything other than the penny arcade!

The penny arcade is located in the 900 block of Manitou Avenue, hidden behind Patsy’s Candies (no wonder I’d never seen it before).  You’ll need to park on the street, which could mean several blocks away if it’s a busy weekend.

I was a little surprised to find out the the arcade is really only partially indoors – it’s really kind of an odd setup, and looks like the arcade is basically uses what used to be a bunch of different storefronts.  Skeeball is in the “main” building, along with the prize counter.  The grocery store kiddie rides are all outside in a covered area, and there’s several other “rooms” or buildings with all sorts of arcade games, from pinball to who-knows-what.  And, some of the arcade games are outside on the sidewalks, too (covered).

We spent about an hour at the arcade and mainly did the kiddie rides and skeeball.  Both of those activities were 25¢ each, and we played for about an hour and spent $5 total.  The games cost whatever they did originally – if it’s a 50-year-old game and cost 25¢ to play when it was “new”, it costs 25¢ to play today!

We couldn’t find any games that were less than a quarter, though I’m sure there were some in the rooms we didn’t go in.  It was a pretty cheap hour of entertainment for our little kiddos, especially since they rode the kiddie rides together!  I would imagine it could get expensive pretty quickly with some of the games for bigger kids, so set your budget, get your change from the change machine (there are several there), and stop playing when the money runs out!

A tip on skeeball – for little kids, try the “newer” skeeball machines, just left of the old ones.  If they don’t get the ball in the hole, the new machines let it roll back, while the old ones swallow your ball.  For a 2 and 5 year old that have trouble getting it up the ramp much less in the hole, that was a big money-saving tip!

All in all, it was a fun, cheap activity – much cheaper than going to a place like Chuck E Cheese’s!  You can see a few more pictures on the Springs Bargains Flickr stream.  The arcade doesn’t have a website, but their phone number is 719.685.9815 and the exact address is 930 Manitou Avenue (right behind Patsy’s Candies).

Don’t forget to check out all the Cheap Things To Do In Colorado Springs!

Have you been to the “penny arcade” in Manitou Springs?  What did you think?