Blood, Trauma, and Biohazard Cleanup in Crestone, CO

Crestone is a statutory town in Saguache County, Colorado, at the foot of the Sangre de Cristo Range on the eastern edge of the San Luis Valley.

The town is named for Crestone Peak and Crestone Needle, the 14,000-foot summits just east of town, whose name comes from the Spanish word crestón, meaning the crest of a helmet or an outcropping of ore.

George Adams platted Crestone in 1880 beside the Luis Maria Baca Grant No. 4, and the Crestone post office opened on November 16, 1880.

A short-lived gold-mining boom around 1900 brought Eastern investors and a railroad spur to town, and the Town of Crestone was incorporated on January 24, 1902.

The 2020 United States census counted 141 residents in Crestone, up from 127 in 2010.

At the 2000 census, Crestone had 45 households and 79 housing units, and about half of the homes in town are used only on a seasonal basis.

The town covers just 0.385 square miles at an elevation of 7,930 feet, on the alluvial fan of North Crestone Creek.

After a long decline that bottomed out at 34 residents in 1970, Crestone was reborn in the 1970s when Maurice and Hanne Strong began granting land in the neighboring Baca Grande to spiritual organizations to build an interfaith center.

The Crestone area is now a renowned spiritual center, home to a Hindu temple, a Zen center, a co-ed Carmelite monastery, and several Tibetan Buddhist centers.

Crestone was designated an International Dark Sky Community in 2021 in recognition of its exceptionally dark night skies.