Cosmic Energy - Part One: We See A UFO

Channel Some New Age Singletrack with Rama and Stickums in Sedona, Arizona

by Dave Rich, Bike Magazine - April 1995

PART I: WE SEE A UFO

At first glance, the UFO looked like a flaming green and white ball shot from a Roman candle. And it could have been.

Just then, we were driving past a high school in the middle of the Res, which is what everyone in the Four Corners area calls the Reservation, the very barren and somewhat eerie 200-mile stretch of slickrock and barbed wire in Arizona that's home to the Navajo and Hopi nations. But the object flew across the horizon in a straight line, neither arcing nor diving, and simply vanished when it struck the Earth's atmosphere. The three of us in the car, Doug, Burney, and I, still can't agree on whether it was a ship or a meteor.

Seeing the UFO was strange, but not as strange as the reaction of the people in Sedona, Arizona, where we were headed at the time. Expecting rolled eyes and doubt, we were met with "Yeah, you should have seen the Mother Ship that landed here last week." and "The energies in Sedona are open for all sorts of spiritual and alien contact.

"As mountain bikers have Moab, New Age crystal fondlers have Sedona. Rama, the owner of Sedona's lone bike shop, Mountain Bike Heaven, says seekers and healers from all over the planet are drawn to the energy emitted by the red sandstone buttes, spires, and pinnacles surrounding the town.

The town itself seems inseparable from the rock, built in and around it like water pouring into a series of bays and inlets. On the outskirts are the four vortexes, the energy centers where people gather to worship their deity of choice, from the sun to Native American spirits to crystals. Shops all over town try to draw you in with offers of free maps to the vortexes. The maps have ads on them for businesses such as the New Earth Lodge Vacation Cottages, Angel's Chakra balancing & Aura Clearing, and Rainbow's End Steak House.

Though it's easy to shrug off the somewhat hokey mysticism of the town, there is powerful mountain biking magic working in Sedona. The area has some of the most scenic and technical trails in the Southwest, set in a backdrop of surreal red rock desert and green vegetation.

Go To Part Two...