Everyone wants to live in Crested Butte, but only 1,654 people do

There’s something about the light at 9,000 feet. Every time I visit Crested Butte, Colorado, the place seems to glow.

There was just a bit of rain falling from the sky, as light as snow, and the sun glowed through it. The clouds that were left hung just above us, since we were at the elevation of the clouds.

We drove in from the direction of Steamboat Springs, after a night at The Barn – my friend’s welcoming home and pastural acreage that was once the launching point for so many mountain newcomers and is now the gathering place and traveler’s rest for the thousands with ties there.

A sign announces that the pavement ends miles outside of Crested Butte. The ground was wet and covered our truck with a film of mud. The late afternoon sun reflected bright off the white bark of aspens.

I’ve loved this town since the moment I discovered it on a wandering Colorado roadtrip decades ago. Earl asked as we pulled in, “Remind me, what’s your tie here?”

“I don’t have one. I just like it.”

As I planned this roadtrip and told people we would stop in Crested Butte, someone warned me, “It’s changed. It’s been discovered.”

But as we climbed the dirt road to town, I wondered how much it could have changed. Surely the effort it takes to get there acts as a kind of filter. It’s not the kind of place you stumble upon while stopping for gas. It’s a destination that takes planning and effort.

I’ve lived in enough towns that draw tourists that I’m sensitive to the line between locals and visitors. There’s something wonderful about a place that’s hard-earned. When you know all the alleys and short cuts and stories behind the stories, it’s a special kind of pain when you can’t get a table because there’s a long line of strangers ahead of you, even if you understand the economics of it all.

So, as we walked down the side streets of Crested Butte, I was aware of my status as the outsider.

The town has a year-round population of 1,600, give or take. As many bikes are parked, unlocked, outside of homes and in the alleys behind Elk Avenue businesses.

I saw an ad for a small office space for rent with a note and an apology that you couldn’t live there. “Wish I had housing here to share with locals.” ??

We stayed at the 12-room Crested Butte Hostel, which is tucked in a neighborhood right in the shadow of the Mother Rock – the pointed peak that gives the town its name.

While we were there, many of the summer residents had just departed for the school year. The temperatures were in the 50s and 60s and the city council was set to discuss a proclamation that protested the name “Crested Butte” as inaccurate. The proclamation would declare Sept. 28 as Pointed Laccolith Day, that name being more geologically correct for the peak the towers over town.

The Crested Butte News published part of the proclamation: “WHEREAS, the name ‘Crested Butte’ is therefore not only inaccurate as a description, but an oxymoron, as buttes by definition do not have crests, and was probably dreamed up by people who had not studied rocks, or perhaps had studied rocks but maybe, who knows, downed a couple two-three beers and thought it would be funny; …”

We walked to The Secret Stash for some pizza. The last time I ate there, it was in a tiny house at the end of the street. It’s in a new, larger location to accommodate its popularity.

They set us up at a table downstairs, separate from the rest of the room in an alcove. As we looked out on the room, we imagined what people it takes to live in Crested Butte. ?

As we ate our fig pizza and burrata salad, we played a game – you have four days to build a life here, how do you do it? We brainstormed how to find housing and a job that matters, when our server came over. He heard the idea of sitting at the bar and announcing what skills you have to offer in hopes of finding work.

“So many people do that,” he said, and his friendliness disappeared as fast as a light switching off. We were cliches, one day visitors falling for the Crested Butte fantasy.

The rain started again and we slept with the window open.

The sun came out mid-morning and we headed toward the famous Oh-Be-Joyful Trail to hike before getting back on the road.

The trail starts at 10,200 feet and is steady climb along the river toward a vista of folding mountains and waterfalls. If the goal was the shake the illusion that Crested Butte was paradise, this was not the way to do it.

The sound of clapping aspen leaves mixed with the rushing of the river. Someone had carved their initials into the white bark of one of the trees and the letters swelled into a grey illegible scar. The trees would open to offer a rocky ledge with a view of the creek or the surrounding mountains and we would have to stop to enjoy. The rocks were covered in a tundra mix of spreading lichens and soft green moss. The water of Oh-Be-Joyful Creek spilled crystal clear over rocks and swirled into eddies. It’s an epic Class V kayak ride for those with the skills to do it.

The hike is an out and back trail – a climb in and an easy descent out. It seemed to be over too soon as we could see the parking lot in the distance. We held hands and walked slowly. It was our last day in the mountains before turning the truck toward home.

We put the truck in four-wheel-drive to climb up the muddy hill back to the dirt road, back through town, and then beyond. Before long, the pavement began again. We followed the winding vistas of Monarch Pass through the recently harvested hay fields toward Denver.

The clerk at the hotel in Sterling, Colorado, told us she loved living there and that you get used to the “smell of money” – the fertilizer plant.

Then on to Omaha. We were on a beeline home to Charleston after almost a month exploring the United States.

I looked up my great great grandfather’s World War I draft card and found an address in Omaha where he first moved from Prague. The address was a building where he operated a bakery and raised the money to buy a ranch in Wyoming. It has bars on the windows now. The only evidence of the building’s current life was a folded, yellow rubber work boot pressed between the closed shade and the glass of the window.

Then to Davenport, Iowa, where I stayed with my neighbors across the street from my old house. The current residents invited us in and they showed me around my old life, which has mostly been renovated away.

I sat on the neighbor’s porch as I had so many nights when I lived there, and we jumped right back into our conversations. I sat in the same chair that was always my chair. A light breeze cut the humidity of the night. It was as if I had never left and could never go back.

It was no longer a roadtrip, but a drive. We were covering miles, ready to be home.

We stopped for one last night in Lexington, Kentucky, and sat at the bar of Dudley’s. It happened to be the day of their 43rd anniversary and they had a menu of favorite dishes from those years. I ordered the Chicken Livers Normandy, with bacon, apples and brandy cream sauce, and a Manhattan with Green River Rye.

We toasted to a month of relived and rewritten memories. Then looked on the map excitedly toward home.

Autumn and Earl would like to help you fulfill your bucket list goals. We can create custom trips. If you have a group of friends you would like to take on a trip, please email [email protected] and we can make it happen.?