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Buildings
& Facilities
Crestone Mountain Zen Center is located at 8400
feet in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in Southern
Colorado. Surrounded by 230 acres of Pinon Pine
and Juniper forest land the campus is formed by
the main house with resident bedrooms, kitchen,
community space, greenhouse and a vegetable garden,
the Zendo (meditation hall), a Japanese style
tea house, a guest house, a workshop with a former
pottery studio that was converted into a dormitory,
a number of small cabins and the Lindisfarne
Dome.
Please take a look at our PHOTO
GALLERY for a first impression of our retreat
facilities.
Natural
Surroundings
At 8,400 feet, the Main House and its vegetable
and flower gardens look out over the San Luis
Valley, an ancient dry lake bed. From the monastery
you can see 50 miles across to the San Juan Mountains
in the west and about 80 miles each direction,
north and south.
Ten miles below in the valley
to the south you can see the Dunefield of the
Great Sand Dunes National Park, the tallest sand
dunes in North America. Beyond that lies Mount
Blanca, 14,345 feet high, one of the sacred world
mountains of the pre-historic Anasazi and present-day
Native Americans in the Southwest.
Behind the campus the land rises steeply into
the mountains bordering Rio Grande National Forest
land. Along the north border of our campus you
can walk up Spanish Creek into a verdant aspen
and spruce covered canyon; to the east, a Chinese-scroll-looking
rocky peak called Dragon’s Rock dominates
the view.
Behind and above the whole property, lifting into
another world of weather and spirit, are the impressive
fourteen thousand foot mountains: Crestone Peak
and Crestone Needle, Kit Carson, Challenger, and
Columbia Point. Many hiking trails are available
in the area.
Lindisfarne
Dome
The Lindisfarne Dome was meant to serve as an
interfaith chapel before the whole property was
given to Dharma Sangha and became part of the
Crestone Zen Mountain Monastery. It was conceived
and designed by William Irwin Thompson and remains
open to the public. It is an impressive interior
space – calm, centering, powerful.
The stunning vaulting of the dome was designed
by Keith Critchlow and engineered by Tony Hunt.
It was constructed by bending in place and laminating
2x4s into 12” thick beams to span 2800 square
feet – then another web of smaller beams
were shaped and laminated behind the main beams.
Finally, thin lengths of wood were laminated together
and formed around the outside of the smaller beams
to make the skin of the dome. The center skylight
is about 24 feet high.
During the Guest Season
the Lindisfarne Dome serves as a main retreat
and practice space for yoga, dance, and other
workshops.
Travel
The nearest airports are Alamosa
(1 hour), Colorado Springs (3 hours), Denver (4
hours) and Albuquerque (5 hours). You will need
to rent a car at the airport or use the locally
available shuttle services. For help with travel
arrangements please feel free to contact
us.
Driving Instructions
from Aspen
from Boulder
from Colorado Springs
from Denver
from Santa Fe
from Taos
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