Passing by Crestone, Colorado reminds me of a road trip coming up five years ago to that destination.
This is a reflection of that journey.
With no airport of its own or anywhere nearby and nestled 8,000 feet above sea level on a Tibetan-like plateau in between peaks and valleys, Crestone is not an easy destination to reach from Santa Barbara: Two flights plus a four-drive drive through towns such as El Rito and La Jara that seem to exist only due to the presence of a Family Dollar variety store.
By 9 o’clock dusk has surrendered to the blackness of night and illuminations become scarce as the artist Van Stein and I roll deeper into rural Colorado, dark roads bereft of anything but the stream of our high beams…
…until arriving, literally, at road’s end high up in the mystical Sangre de Cristo Mountains.
A place where all the world’s ancient faiths coexist in harmony.
A place known by its inhabitants as Enlightenment Town.
All the action this night (any night) is Crestone Brewery, townspeople spilling onto porches and beyond, their kids stooled at the bar and big friendly dogs running around inside, everyone smiley and happy among wafting aromas of body odor and patchouli oil.
The IPA on tap is called Mystics & misfits and this about sums up the natives of this old mining town-turned-spiritual-hub, extending to our good selves for having made this pilgrimage.
Our appreciative if weary smiles are immediate and our eardrums vibrate with banjo strings from a quartet called Haywire that stimulates hoots and whoops and compels the natives to dance like there’s no tomorrow and nowhere have I seen so many amazing hats in one place anchored by bohemian togs either homemade or puzzled together from thrift shops—toss in an Eastern influence.
We watch, listen, marvel, exchange glances, drain our mugs and order snifters of a dark brew called Impermanence, toast our wisdom for trekking here, a zone that so uniquely epitomizes spiritual human existence in a natural setting.
Sometime past midnight we straggle out to find the Crestone Inn whose caretaker promised to leave two rooms unlocked with keys on an inside table. Number 5 reeks of stale tobacco and has a white tile floor that rubs me the wrong way so I offer it to Van Stein and I take Number 6, hardwood floor, no reek and no key either to lock up after myself.
Before bed I snap a few pics of the half-moon hiding out behind a cloud cluster seeded with demons hanging low in the sky—and that’s about as near as they’ll get to me in this heavenly setting.
I awaken to dawn streaming through window blinds and rise briefly to slide open a glass door for fresh air then linger in bed absorbing the sound of silence, save the occasional bird trill.
Caffeination means The Cloud Station whose offerings include luscious carrot cake and live music (in the morning!) and colorful characters.
Before noon a farmers’ market blooms though only one stall-holder is selling produce (a dozen heads of lettuce) while others peddle polished stones and painted wood. I’m not looking to buy buying but listening out for a message from the universe through random snippets of overheard conversation in the marketplace, where Oracle resides.
This is what I hear: “Nobody cares.”
And I immediately get that. Nobody Cares. You think you’re smart, important, proud of your achievements and then another day you dwell upon the low points of your life, the things you screwed up… well, snap out of it because… NOBODY CARES.
I loaf and saunter and take an afternoon snooze because that’s what being here is all about: Basking in the aura of whatever inspired all these spiritual people to relocate to Crestone. And now, lying on my back with extremities stretched out, I observe my brain as it flows from one thought to another… until I’m lost in a netherland of dreams…
Bang-bang-BANG! I awaken with a start from blissful slumber.
A little boy of about three-years old has pounded on my glass sliding door at 3:33 in the afternoon.
(Said the mayor of Crestone to a reporter: “This is a great place if you want to wake up.”)
Wake up, nobody cares.
And thus awakened I take a walk and become pleasantly astonished by the quiet, the stillness. I can hear no birds singing nor insects chirping, no hint of an aircraft engine, leaf-blower or air conditioning unit. No sound waves of any kind, not even a breeze, and it becomes clear that silence is the language of God.
Nearing the cocktail hour we set off for Desert Sage Restaurant, the only “fine dining” experience in town. After alighting from our vehicle I’m awed all over again by the absence of any sound whatsoever.
Ordering a libation is simplified by lack of choice. “Our supplier didn’t make it this week,” the manager shrugs.
We settle for 1800 Anejo tequila, a few rocks, slice of lime—as good as anything else I might have wanted.
Our guest this evening is a displaced Brit known locally as the “King of Crestone.” He introduces his kingdom to us as “the quietest place on earth.” (Yup, got that.)
We are meeting this gentleman because I knew his father in passing from my past life as a spy. This old Etonian has seen Crestone change in three decades from having absolutely nothing beyond monasteries and retreat centers to having almost absolutely nothing. It saddens him that Crestone is destined to become the next Sedona due to skyrocketing property prices and people moving in from all over.
“From Denver and Santa Fe?” I ask in between bites of Yak burger (denser and richer than beef), raised locally by Tibetan monks.
“From everywhere.” he replies. “Especially New York. There used to be zero crime here but now it’s, well, edgy.” He pauses, lowers his voice. “Drugs.”
In particular, methamphetamines.
“It’s intense here,” he adds, which surprises me because to my mind this quiet, tension-free zone seems the opposite of intense.
Here’s the answer: The air may be thin at this high altitude but the vibes are thickened by multiple truth-seekers questing to figure it all out and maybe trying too hard.
Overhearing the artist and me banter about photographing the dramatic sunset about to take place, Crestone’s king points us where to see it best, up a gravel road named Dream Way. And so, wordlessly, we roll there to the strains of Hildegarde von Bingen until we find ourselves at a stupa, park and alight.
No one is around to include any life beyond trees and bushes rendering this spot the quietest place yet. Pure silence.
God’s voice.
Crestone is where Mecca and Jerusalem and Bodh Gaya and Native American lore meet for a spiritual smorgasbord of whatever-works.
Long before it became a spiritual hub for multiple faiths and a refuge for truth-questers it was (still is) holy ground for the Hopi and the Navajo Native Americans, a place where indigenous tribes believe the rocks and bushes and trees talk to those willing to listen and where non-duality or oneness is the only concept that makes any sense.
Some hail Crestone the New Age capital of the USA. Yet with its low thread-count New Agers rarely last very long here, preferring Sedona with its luxury accommodations and numerous gift shops filled with over-priced quartz jewelry and aura-photography and astrologers.
Which means this site is more about Old Age, as in, ancient wisdom pertaining to those who were already here, the Native Americans. About respecting and preserving the beliefs of those who came before us with ceremonies, rituals and enduring texts from centuries ago.
We return to town, to the heart of Saturday night i.e. Crestone Brewery, a hint of marijuana in the air, beer splashing around and much bonhomie.
Mystics, misfits, elderly hippies and their hipster offspring—folks who have checked out of the material world and gone off-grid including a gal strumming a ukulele with a big bone in her hair, what Pebbles from The Flintstones would look like all grown up.
The vibe here is even quirkier than the night before and all I can do is self-radiate in its aura like I’ve been doing all day long, a divine state that seems to be a mountain thing—or maybe only a Crestone thing.
Are mountains a magnet for those that desire to be free from the world and/or from their own minds?
One might speculate that lack of oxygen causes the mind to back off and allow the soul to experience a natural high that leads to illuminations or, seen another way (cynically), could Himalaya-style “enlightenment” be just a delusion caused by oxygen deprivation?
I’ve viewed and reviewed several times that special moment of both movies scripted from W. Somerset Maugham’s novel The Razor’s Edge in which protagonist/ knowledge-seeker Larry Darrell sits atop a peak in the Himalayas and finally gets it. (Bill Murray seems to get it better than Tyrone Power.)
I’ve read and reread that passage by Maugham in which enlightenment takes place just before dawn as the sun’s first rays literally light up a new day.
Or as Larry Darrell explains what crossing the razor’s edge is truly about:
The day broke in splendor. Those mountains… deep jungle… mist entangled in the treetops… bottomless lake far below me. The sun caught the lake… and it shone like burnished steel. I was ravished with the beauty of the world. I’d never known such exaltation and transcendent joy. A tingling arose in my feet and traveled to my head… suddenly released from my body and a pure spirit partook of a loveliness I had never conceived. A knowledge more than human possessed me… everything that had been confused was clear… everything that had perplexed me explained. No words can tell the ecstasy of my bliss.