Durango Smoke Shop---Durango, Colorado

I found this place while we were staying at the General Palmer Hotel in Durango, Colorado. They're across the street close to the narrow gauge train tracks of the Silverton steam train. They've got a pretty good selection of tobaccos, blends they make in house. I got a couple blends from there I enjoy quite a bit. Mountain Dew which is a light and dark Cavendish with Latakia. And Nostalgia which is a blend of Virginias. It's a pretty nice, small shop. I watch the Silverton train head out around 8am while enjoying a morning pipe and coffee (always there, always hot, always free, always good, for guests of the Palmer.)Then join the wife for the free breakfast at the General Palmer. Then walk across the street and stock up on pipe tobacco. Can't beat it. If you're in Durango, check it out.
I live on the rez and there isn't any pipe tobacco out here. Got to get tobacco whenever you can when you run across shops you can smell the goods and make an informed decision. There is internet but I'm a funny guy. Got to see it and smell it. Nearest town is Flagstaff and there is a decent smoke shop there with good pipe tobacco at a great price. It is mostly Peter Stokkebye bulk blends. I get English Luxury from there. Stocked up on that, too, since it's a 2-1/2 hour drive to Flagstaff from here to get more.
Only thing is, there isn't any Perique to be had at any shop close to here. Strange. And I need to get some. Like I said, on the rez here, there really isn't any pipe tobacco. Many people out here smoke a wild tobacco (Nicotiana Attenuata is the plant genus.) Probably because it's free---when you can find it growing. It's pretty potent. Most folks mix it with other plants into "smokes" so they're called. You can find them at flea markets here sometimes.

Not sure, but very happy with it.

Yeah, Durango is like Flagstaff, AZ. Expensive! I lived in Flagstaff for 14 years. Cheaper on the rez here. For one thing, there's nothing to buy out here, ha ha ha!
But there's nothing like the smell of coal smoke from that train in the morning, mixing with the smoke from my pipe and the aroma of hot coffee.

Johnnyreb, the Four Corners area is unique. I actually live on the outskirts of Monument Valley. I can see the beginnings of the sandstone formations from the bedroom window. Wife and I sometimes shop at the grocery store there. Grocery stores out here are some of the few you'll find the old scissor-type sheep shears, salt licks, axes, axe handles, and woodstove parts for sale right next to the food items. But no pipe tobacco, lol! I noticed property for sale between Cortez and Durango a couple weeks or so ago. Most of the actual Four Corners area is on the Navajo Nation, so property acquisition at the actual place itself presents some problems. But outside the rez, the property is still available. The issue with a lot of the property is water and utilities. You'll see some listings that look cheap and wonder why. Because there's no well and you have to haul water in. And no utilities, so you have to get solar panels. But if you watch the listings, you can find people on developed properties (with water and utilities) who've had enough of the isolation and are looking to get out and have reasonable prices.

Johnnyreb, I live on the Arizona side. Funny, there's a dude down the road that sells frybread from a makeshift stand. Did you try mutton stew? Also known as hominy stew. Great on a cold night.
Mexican Hat is a cool place. We went up to Glenwood Springs, Colorado recently and passed through there. Once in a great while we go to Farmington, NM. But our usual destination for supplies is Flagstaff, AZ, as it is with most folks out here. We go to Durango for a getaway. Oh! This last time we went to Durango, there were having a Cowboy Poetry Festival there. There was a parade and our hotel room at the General Palmer faced the street. So we just opened the window and watched it. Wow! You should have seen the draught horses they had and the old freight wagons. Horse with hooves the size of dinner plates, the real deal. Two cowboys had horses that you could tell were not happy to be around crowds. Right at the beginning, they started frog-hopping and bucking and they had to walk the horses off the parade. That was something to see. They even had an old horse-drawn firewagon there. Only ever seen one of those in a museum. But the draught horses and old freight wagons, wow, those were something to see. Watched the steam train in the morning and then got to see and hear all the horses and wagons right afterwards while staying in an old hotel. Gave me a tiny little window into what it might have been like "back in the day".

Johnnyreb, there's not much in Cortez as far as compared to Durango. I mean, it's a town and it's bigger than where I live. But then, there's a lot of places bigger than where I live, ha ha ha! But if you were buying property in the region, the area around Cortez would probably be cheaper than around Durango. And Durango would be close enough to drive up to pretty quickly. It's like Flagstaff, where I used to live. Flagstaff is expensive to live in. So a lot of people live in Williams or even the outlying areas of Flagstaff like Doney Park. Some people even live in Winslow and commute in to Flagstaff. But that ain't such a great deal in winter and early spring because in winter, that stretch of I40 is an iceskating rink and in spring the winds are high enough to blow over RVs and tractor trailers. There's quite a few roadside shrine crosses on that stretch of I40. A lot of people can't afford to live in Flagstaff but that's where the jobs are. They say in Flagstaff "You take part of your pay in scenery" to explain the low wages. This is the situation in a lot of places like Flagstaff and Durango. High cost of living and low wages. Once a town achieves "funky" status, prices go up and wages don't match it. The key is to live in the nearby towns or outlying areas. Look at Jerome, Arizona. Used to be an abandoned copper mining town and they couldn't give buildings away there. Now old shacks are selling for what you'd pay for a much bigger and nicer house elsewhere. Because artists discovered Jerome. Same with Bisbee, another old copper mining town that was dying until artists found it. So far, no one has discovered the other copper mining towns. But I guess no one wants to live in Bagdad, AZ, if they have a choice, ha ha ha!