STORIES: Crestone

Crestone is a place. Imagine a strip of asphalt running straight for miles and miles, cutting across a flat, desolate expanse. You follow it all the way to the end, and at a certain point in front of you, like a cathedral in the middle of nowhere, the Sangre de Christo appears: an imposing mountain range full of greenery, waterfalls and snow-capped peaks. If you turn your gaze to the right (that is, south) you can instead make out the white sand dunes of the Great Sand Dunes National Park. Up to here it is a “simple” place, wonderful from a natural, scenic point of view, located in Colorado, of which, fortunately, there are many in the world.

But Crestone is not just that. Emanuela and I went there on the advice of Max Monti, who considers it one of the most beautiful places in the world. Crestone is a small village full of Buddhist and Hindu temples, inhabited by an eccentric mix of “seventies”-style ex-hippies and alternative young people.

You realise you are in a place that doesn't exist right at the entrance to the village, where someone has decided to raise a series of improbable animals: from ostriches to Tibetan yaks and South American llamas, all in the same field. Our lodgings were a little outside the village, on a flat, desert expanse with a few withered shrubs and sharp stones, in a building that looks like a giant igloo or, given the landscape, a shelter for astronauts on Mars. We are not really the sociable type, so we spent our two evenings in Crestone outside our igloo, with a night-time temperature below zero, dry air and a clear sky where, also thanks to the abundant use of weed, we felt as if we were in an astronomical observatory. Naturally we didn't miss out on a trek up one of the peaks of the “Sangre de Cristo”, but before starting our climb we stopped at Crestone's only café, where early on Sunday morning there were 3-4 musicians, clearly locals of many years, improvising free jazz in a surreal atmosphere.

Why talk about this trip to Crestone today? Because an album and a film by Animal Collective, dedicated entirely to this place, have just come out. Fantastic music that can describe the countless nuances, emotions and sensations better than many words. Have a good trip!

m.m.

STORIES is a column dedicated to great stories from the past that can inspire your present.