One Strange Trip Down the Cosmic Highway
Words by Ben Giese | Photos by Jimmy Bowron
Shangri-La is a mythical earthly paradise, isolated from the rest of the world somewhere deep in a mountain pass. The fictional utopia is said to be located peacefully at the base of a harmonious valley full of exoticism and spirituality. British author James Hilton famously describes Shangri-La in his 1933 novel Lost Horizon as a permanent happy land whose inhabitants have become almost immortal. He describes the valley as both a physical and spiritual paradise where the people are happy and without want. In ancient Tibetan scriptures, Shangri-La is believed to be located in Asia, hidden somewhere in the Kunlun Mountains on the northern edge of the Tibetan Plateau. But after a profoundly strange trip through Southern Colorado’s San Luis Valley, I’m not too sure. We just might have found the real Shangri-La right here in our own backyard.
The San Luis Valley is a large, flat basin that stretches from southern Colorado into northern New Mexico. This mystical desert landscape is bookended by two majestic mountain ranges – the Sangre de Cristo Mountains towering to the east and the San Juan Mountains rising to the west. The Sangre de Cristo Mountains contain several peaks over 14,000 feet, including the highest in the range, Blanca Peak. For much of the year, those peaks remain snow-capped, rising like gods from the Earth’s crust and illuminating the sublime contrast when seen from the desert basin below. At the base of the Sangre de Cristos you’ll find the Great Sand Dunes, a marvel of nature containing the tallest sand dunes in North America, with over 30 square miles and 5 billion cubic meters of sand. To the west, you’ll see the San Juans, rich in minerals like gold and silver, along with several more beautiful peaks, painting heavenly backdrops on both sides of the valley.
There’s an uncanny spiritual energy you feel when passing through the San Luis Valley that’s hard to put into words. I felt it the first time I drove through, and I’m sure that energy is what drew the natives there thousands of years ago. Paleolithic hunters once killed now-extinct ice animals in the San Luis Valley, and throughout the following millennia numerous tribes would use the area for vision quests and sacred hunting grounds. Eventually the Capote band of Ute people established their dominance in the region. The Utes believed that all living things possess supernatural power, and they would receive that power from dreams, rituals and the magical land that encompasses the San Luis Valley.
The Navaho people called Blanca Peak the Sacred Mountain of the East. That’s where they claimed to see “star people” entering into our reality aboard flying pods – one of the many legends that intrigue me about this region. Several of the native Southwestern tribes also consider the San Luis Valley to be the location of the sipapu, or “place of emergence.” According to native folklore, somewhere near the Great Sand Dunes, they would gather for a ritual where the Earth would open up and ancient beings would welcome them inside for protection and cleansing.
These days, the San Luis Valley is often referred to as the “Bermuda Triangle of the West.” It contains a maximum-intensity aeromagnetic zone, which means that aircraft conducting geological surveys of the region record astonishingly high levels of magnetism. Strangely, many of the most fascinating and unexplainable ancient civilizations and monoliths across the globe – such as Stonehenge, Machu Picchu, the Mayan temples and the Great Pyramid of Giza – also existed in anomalous electromagnetic zones like this. And much like the natives of the San Luis Valley, those civilizations had a vast understanding of astronomy, a deep connection with the stars and a profound relationship with the “gods” that supposedly came from those stars.
Many people believe that the numerous artifacts resembling flying machines found at those ancient sites are actually depictions of ancient UFO sightings, like the flying pods described by the Navaho people in the San Luis Valley. It’s easy to roll your eyes at the subject, but to this day, residents of the San Luis Valley frequently report strange occurrences in the sky. With more recorded sightings of unexplainable aerial phenomena than almost anywhere in the country, the region is considered by many to be the hotbed of UFO activity in North America.
Thinking about all of these strange circumstances and connections makes me wonder: Does the San Luis Valley hold secrets from a forgotten ancient world? Is there some truth to those Native American legends? What are people really seeing in the skies above the San Luis Valley? And why aren’t more people talking about these things? With my curiosity at an all-time high, it was time to gear up and search for some answers. So I rounded up a few friends who seemed down for a weird weekend, and we hit the road. Andrew Campo and I rode some new Ténéré 700s that Yamaha lent us, and our friends Jimmy Bowron and Derek Mayberry loaded up all the camping gear and followed along in Jimmy’s truck. The goal of this trip was to escape the city for a few days and enjoy some lighthearted adventure while searching for answers to the unexplained. So with open minds and endless amounts of enthusiasm, our strange journey began.
Three hours south of Denver we veered onto CO-17, a 50-mile stretch deemed the Cosmic Highway by locals. My eyes were already scanning the clouds for anything abnormal as we approached the small village of Crestone. With a population of only 146 residents, Crestone is the self-proclaimed “New Age religious capital of the world.” Native Americans embraced the uncanny spiritual energy here in the valley for thousands of years, and modern-day Crestone is no different. With dozens of Hindu temples, Carmelite monasteries, Tibetan Buddhist stupas and Zen centers, Crestone is home to an eclectic mix of world religions and spiritual traditions. It’s wild to stumble upon such an exotic place hidden right here in the Colorado mountains. It makes me wonder, did we just find the elusive Shangri-La we’ve heard about in mythology? I’m not too sure… But we found an interesting mix of humans and stories, to say the least.
We parked our bikes off the main street that runs through Crestone and found some shade at a nearby picnic table. A few minutes later, a rusty old Toyota pickup truck rumbled in and skidded to a stop next to us. It sat on oversized mud tires, and the driver door was held closed with some duct tape. There were five or six dogs eyeing us down from the bed as a large bearded man in a tie-dye shirt stepped out and offered us a beer. I asked to pet his dogs, and he said, “They’ll bite you,” as one of them snarled and snapped at me. He proceeded to grab us some beers and sat down to drink them with us, occasionally looking over his shoulder to yell at the dogs. He asked what we were doing in Crestone, and I told him that we were here to explore some of the strange rumors that have been buzzing from this little town. I asked if he’s ever seen anything abnormal in the sky, and he responded without hesitation, “Oh yeah, tons of weird shit…” He squinted and looked at me as if my question was stupid. Obviously we weren’t from around here. He proceeded to tell us that everyone here has seen weird things in the sky. He continued explaining that most of the UFO sightings come from the over the mountains above Blanca Peak, just like the Navaho people described from “the sacred mountain of the east”, and can often be seen flying south along the base of the mountains towards the Great Sand Dunes.
I asked a few more locals around town about their experiences and got a similar answer from almost all of them. Of course they’ve seen things in the sky. It’s normal around here. Nobody wanted to make a big deal about it, and it was hard to get any specific details because nobody really even cares enough to talk about it. UFOs are just part of living in this town, and the residents seem to be tired of outsiders coming in and making a big fuss about it. I want these stories to be true more than anything, and I desperately want to see something for myself, but I remain skeptical. I take note of the culture here in Crestone and notice that most people are dressed in tie-die, kimonos or exotic fabrics with worldly patterns. Shoes are few and far between, and the majority of residents have dreadlocks. Common fashion accessories seem to be beads, bracelets, headbands, necklaces, and psychedelic colored sunglasses. I realize it’s never fair to stereotype, but I’m under the assumption that large amounts of drugs are consumed here – which makes me question the legitimacy of all these stories. Are the residents of Crestone truly seeing UFOs in the sky above their town, or are they just baked out of their minds? Either way, the four of us remain curious and optimistic and the search continues.
On our way out of Crestone, we explored some backroads that led us farther up into the mountains. As we gained elevation, the pavement crumbled into a rocky dirt road, and for the next several miles we passed various spiritual centers tucked away in the trees. The route was lined with Tibetan Buddhist prayer flags, and at the end of the road we discovered a beautiful white and gold stupa towering up from the hillside. It suddenly felt like we were transported to the high mountains of Nepal. As we looked out over the valley and down toward the base of the stupa, we saw a sunburnt man kneeling in prayer and speaking in tongues. He had obviously been there for a long time and wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon. The August sun was cooking the four of us, and I questioned how that man could stay down there roasting for so long? It seemed like a miserable situation, but what do I know? Maybe Shangri-La is a state of consciousness – somewhere you go internally. Maybe that’s where he was at. Or maybe he was just tripping balls. We’ll never know. By this point we were all hot, dirty and thirsty, so we made our way back down the mountain to a nearby river to cool off and clean up.
Feeling refreshed, we continued our journey south on the Cosmic Highway, and as we approached the small town of Hooper, I recalled another fascinating story that a local told us earlier that day, which supposedly had happened somewhere nearby. It all started in 1967, when a horse named Lady was found lying dead with her head stripped clean to the bone. When the owner found the horse several days later, it wasn’t bloated and it didn’t smell. They noticed that the horse’s footprints ended over a hundred feet away from where the remains were lying. The animal’s lungs, heart and thyroid were gone, along with the brain, abdominal organs and spinal fluid. There was no blood on the skin or on the ground or anywhere to be found. The cuts on the carcass appeared to be cauterized and surgically precise, like they had been cut from a laser. There’s no way it could be from coyotes or vultures. Even stranger, cauterizing laser technology like that didn’t exist in the 1960s. The horse was eventually renamed Snippy and became almost as famous in death as the most famous racehorse Man o’ War was in his prime. Maybe some deranged high-tech psychopath killed Snippy. Or maybe it was aliens. Over the last five decades, there have been several more unexplainable animal mutilations in the valley, and Snippy’s death still remains a mystery. It’s hard not to draw a connection between those strange animal mutilations and the uncanny UFO activity happening in the San Luis Valley.
My recollection of Snippy is quickly interrupted as we rolled up on one of my favorite roadside attractions, the UFO Watchtower. I’ve stopped here a few times before when passing through the valley, but I’m excited to learn more about this quirky place. Riding through the entrance and up the driveway makes me smile as we pass dozens of alien statues and UFO sculptures. We parked our bikes outside the small white dome, which contains a fun little gift shop and a UFO-viewing platform built above. In front of the dome there’s a “rock garden” that looks more like a pile of trash at first glance. But as you wander through and take a closer look, you’ll find hundreds of random trinkets left behind by visitors to the tower. These trinkets are supposed to be offerings to the extraterrestrials to teach them about life on Earth. Visitors leave behind everything from faded baseball cards to old drivers licenses, sunglasses, bras, handwritten notes and pretty much anything else you could think of. It’s like a sun-faded time capsule with over twenty years of junk collected from people all over the world. I laugh to myself when I think about aliens that have traveled 100 million light years to receive offerings like a rabbit foot key chain or an old Britney Spears album lying in the dirt.
Inside the gift shop we meet the property owner, Judy Messoline. She’s been running the UFO Watchtower for twenty years now ,and it’s the last thing she ever imagined doing. Judy moved to the San Luis Valley to raise cattle in the ’90s and quickly realized that cattle can’t survive in the desert. “Cows don’t eat sand,” she says jokingly. When her cattle ranch was failing, Judy’s neighbor would talk about all the strange things she’s seen in the skies above the San Luis Valley and joked that Judy should build a roadside attraction for people to view UFOs. Judy was skeptical, but feeling desperate, she decided to listen to her neighbor and opened up a campground and a UFO Watchtower on her property. She had no expectations and had never even seen one herself, but the San Luis Valley attracts UFO seekers from all over the world, and little did she know her new business would attract tens of thousands of enthusiastic visitors over the subsequent two decades.
When Judy first opened the UFO Watchtower in 2000, she never thought she would actually see anything. But over the last twenty years she says there have been over 200 sightings at the tower, and she’s personally witnessed 28 of them. Her most notable memory was of a cigar-shaped craft that she observed, alongside a dozen other people, as it zipped across the valley at unimaginable speeds. Guests at the tower have reported numerous different accounts, varying from spheres, orbs, triangles, saucers and top-hat shaped objects, to name a few. Judy says that the majority of the sightings seem to happen near hot water wells, and she seems to think that the geothermal water that flows beneath the fault line at the base of the mountains has something to do with it. As she explains all of this, she just throws her arms up, shrugs and shakes her head, because she knows how crazy it all sounds.
I’m trying to connect the dots in my head, and Judy’s theory of the underground geothermal water running along the base of the mountains sounds strangely consistent with the flight pattern described by the locals in Crestone. It’s also consistent with the legends told by the Navaho people. I’m curious if those underground geothermal water wells have something to do with the Sipapu where natives claimed ancient beings rose from the earth. It’s also strange that all of this happens to be right inside that magnetic anomaly zone. There’s gotta be something to all of this. It’s hard to find any concrete answers, but this day just keeps getting weirder, and I’m loving it.
We said farewell to our new friend Judy and continued our ride down the Cosmic Highway. Somewhere near the town of Mosca, we turned off onto a dirt road and headed west a few more miles into the open desert. We found the perfect campsite situated in the middle of nowhere, cracked open a few cold beers, dug a fire pit and set up our tents. A local motorcyclist rolled in to check out our bikes and ended up hanging out to watch us shoot some photos of our Yamahas at sunset. His name was Dwight Catalano, and he told us that he’s lived here in the San Luis Valley for his entire life.
After the shoot we invited Dwight to join us around the campfire, and I told him that we were here to explore some of the unexplained mysteries here in the valley. His eyes lit up as he laughed and proceeded to tell us about his favorite UFO experience. In 2006, Dwight was gearing up to go ride his dirt bike and looked up to see a large gray sphere floating in the sky above him. He said the sphere was smooth and colorless with small portholes all around it. He watched it hover for a while and nothing happened, so eventually he put his helmet on and went riding. When he returned to his truck, he looked up and it was still there. He took off his gear and looked back up at the sphere, and a few moments later it shot straight up into the sky – in his words “at an unbelievable speed.” Dwight didn’t think too much about it at the time, but revisiting that memory around the campfire all these years later he seems genuinely intrigued to know what that object really was.
He then told us about a similar experience his uncle had here in the San Luis Valley back in 1948. His uncle was driving a tractor, pulling a large hay trailer across his 22,000-acre ranch, when he came across a large saucer hovering 30 feet above the road directly in front of him. He was too afraid to drive under the craft, so he froze in terror and waited until it flew away.
I’m fascinated by the UFO stories of that era, because many people believe the sudden influx of sightings in the 1940s correlates with our development of nuclear weapons technology. The first nuclear bomb was dropped in 1945 near White Sands, New Mexico, and over the following decade the American Southwest was plagued with a number of unexplainable events, most famously the 1947 crash in Roswell, New Mexico. Everyone’s heard about the reported recovery of a crashed alien spacecraft in Roswell. However, most people are unaware that at the time of the incident, Roswell Army Airfield was home to the world’s only atomic bomber squadron, the 509th Bomb Group. Is it all just a coincidence? Maybe. Are there reasonable explanations to all of these overlapping stories? Possibly. But between the Native American folklore, the geological anomalies, the unexplainable aerial phenomena and their strange connection to nuclear technology, it all just seems too coincidental. There’s gotta be something going on here that we just don’t fully understand. We still don’t have any definitive answers, but at least it all makes for some good campfire talk.
Dwight said farewell and headed home as the four of us got cozy around the fire, gazed up and let our thoughts drift into the aether. I found myself lost somewhere in the Milky Way, floating through a sea of billions of stars into the great beyond. It was the peak of 2020’s most prominent meteor shower, and as we watched balls of fire light up the atmosphere, I thought to myself: Maybe this is where those ancient people found god. It’s no wonder they had such an infatuation with the stars. I don’t think humans were designed to be packed into cities, spending our days in virtual worlds behind glowing screens. We’ve disconnected ourselves from the natural world, and I think we’re depriving ourselves from some of the most primal things that make us human. We need to spend more time outside, under the stars, appreciating our place in the universe. It’s ironic how looking up can make you feel so grounded. I’m just feeling thankful to be on this journey and alive here in this moment.
I look around at my friends who seem to be feeling the same way and think to myself, maybe we finally found the Shangri-La we’ve been looking for. Right here in this barren patch of dirt under the stars. A tribe of brothers sitting around the fire like the natives have done here for thousands of years. Suddenly it feels like I understand the spirituality of this valley, and all the problems happening in the world right now seem so distant. We enjoyed this moment of bliss for several more hours until a pack of coyotes cackled us to sleep. It’s been one strange adventure, and while we might not have seen any UFOs during our time in the San Luis Valley, it’s hard to imagine we could be alone in this endless cosmos.
