What to know if you go

Jeff Topping/The New York Times (ENLARGE)
Angel Lightfeather, a spiritual counselor, outside the Center for the New Age in Sedona.
Jeff Topping/The New York Times (ENLARGE)
Tourists watching the sunset from an overlook at Airport Hill in Sedona in March.
Jeff Topping/The New York Times (ENLARGE)
Goods on display at a New Age store.
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A few years ago, USA Today called Sedona, Ariz., the most beautiful place in America. At sundown, that doesn't begin to cover it. And it's not just the views.

Nowhere else in this country does a natural setting feel so much like the inside of a soaring pantheistic cathedral. On a late afternoon the sinking sun beams a powdery light over the buttes, spires and mesas.

But there's also a vibe in the air, a kind of metaphysical dog whistle that calls people out to try to feel something that (if you're not a committed New-Age pilgrim) is hard to put into words.

Resistant to New Age

I wanted to feel something, too, even though — full disclosure — I lack the spiritual gene.

Somewhat inexplicably, though, I found myself on my first evening in Sedona standing on a hill called Mystic Vista, taking in the mind-bending views and trying to soak up some "vortex" energy.

Sedona is famous for its so-called vortex sites, spots where the earth's energy is supposedly increased, leading to self-awareness and various kinds of healing. (Think of them as spiritual hot tubs without the water.)

I'd taken a New Age jeep tour with a company called Earth Wisdom. Four of us leapt out of the jeep and made the short hike up to Mystic Vista: me, a sixtyish guide named Larry Sprague and two long-haired seekers, a husband and wife from Arkansas.

Once we were up there, we did some things that embarrassed me. Sprague hugged a tree. We all dowsed. In hushed tones, Sprague told us about ancient Native American rituals and the vision quests he'd been on.

In search of the vortex vibe

I wasn't feeling the vortex vibes, or much of anything else. But at sundown, the guy from Arkansas brought out a drum and starting tapping on it, Iron John-style.

As if on cue, Larry-the-tour-guide pulled out a wooden flute and began accompanying him, playing cryptic Native American-inspired riffs. Anyplace else, this improvised duet would have made me flee back down the mountain. Up here, it sounded surprisingly groovy. It was a Sedona moment. I felt like I'd arrived.

Alien abductions

The New Age parade arrived here in force in 1987. That was the year of the Harmonic Convergence when believers flocked to mystical places across the planet, hoping for a global awakening of harmony and love.

Some 5,000 of these believers crammed into Sedona. (It may or may not be a coincidence that Stevie Nicks was born only two hours away.)

A few hundred of them stood in front of a formation called Bell Rock, waiting for its lid to open and reveal a UFO.

No flying saucer emerged, but word about this place began to spread.

"Even today, if you walked into a cafe and asked how many people had been abducted by aliens," one long-time resident, the writer Eve Conant, told me, "I suspect one in 10 would raise their hands."

A popular Sedona diner is called Red Planet, where alien kitsch decorates the walls and, at night, you can drink a "Mothership Margarita" and bathe in the intense pinkish glow cast by neon lights.

'Hard to live here and not be ... spiritual'

The New Age crowd was assimilated into Sedona with a surprising lack of friction. "These people are interesting, and they don't bother anyone," said Ivan Finley, Sedona's mayor in the late 1990s.

"And how can you quarrel with them? Even for those of us who don't dance in circles, it's hard to live here and not be a little bit spiritual. It's a humbling place."

Still, the U.S. Forest Service sometimes complains about the stone medicine wheels that people build — and leave — in the wilderness.

The New Age migrants were not the first to be drawn to this mystical place. Native American tribes, including the Yavapai and later the Tonto Apache, were drawn there as early as 1300 A.D.

They were driven off the land by the U.S. Army in the 1870s after gold was discovered in nearby Prescott. (You can find well-preserved cave paintings and rock art all around Sedona. The Palatki Ruins, a few miles out of town, are especially good.)

The more recent influx of big money — Al Pacino owns a house — and skyrocketing housing prices do have a lot of local people worried, however. "Sedona is definitely becoming a place for the haves, not the have-nots," Sprague tells visitors, in a weary voice, on his jeep tour.

Still feels like a small town

Yet the best thing about Sedona — especially in the off-season — is that it feels like the small town that it really is. The city's year-round population is still only about 11,000, a number that's swollen by the more than 3 million tourists who visit every year, mostly in the summer.

"This is still the kind of place where, when you go to the grocery store, you know a lot of people," Conant said.

I'd come to Sedona with my wife and two young children in early February, the quiet season. The views are so stupendous that rubbernecking tourists, gazing upward at the red rocks, swerve crazily across the medians.

We were probably swerving, too, as we entered the city. We'd flown into Phoenix, two hours south of Sedona, late the night before. We got out of Phoenix early and spent the morning in Jerome, a terrifically crusty historic mining town that clings to a mountainside about 30 miles west of Sedona.

Friends had told us not to miss the abandoned Gold King Mine, now a rambling outdoor graveyard of rusting old mining equipment. They were right.

This place may be the most perfectly unfussy museum left in America. For a few dollars, you can walk the grounds — it's like touring the ghostly, hulking ruins of the early American industrial age. The children loved the rabbits and chickens that run free there, and the penned-up goats that nibble pellets out of your hand.

A taste of old Sedona

If you want a feel for old Sedona, show up for breakfast at the Coffee Pot restaurant, a place popular with local folk. After breakfast, take a walk downtown, where you quickly get a sense of this city's contradictions.

The soaring red rocks rise above clusters of mostly tasteful housing developments and a downtown that's lined with strip malls. (Beware the storefronts with signs saying "visitor's information" that are actually full of aggressive time-share salesmen.)

One of the best things to do in Sedona while you're getting your bearings is to take a jeep tour of the surrounding landscape.

In addition to the Earth Wisdom tour I took, I climbed aboard the popular "Broken Arrow" tour run by the Pink Jeep Tours company, a local institution. My children came too, and they screamed (mostly with delight) almost the whole way: These jeeps go over rocks and up inclines that you would have thought were impossible. The trails are so demanding that, according to Pink Jeep, Goodyear frequently supplies the tour company with free tires for testing.

This tour gives you a good sense of why Hollywood, in the era of westerns, was so taken with Sedona. Among the movies made here: "Riders of the Purple Sage" (1931), John Wayne's "Angel and the Badman" (1947) and the James Stewart movie "Broken Arrow" (1950).

Sedona has more than 100 hiking trails, and it's hard to pick a bad one.

Enchantment Resort

After two days of exploring and one night at the Matterhorn Inn, an inexpensive hotel in the downtown shopping district, we were more than ready for some R & R.

We found it at the appropriately named Enchantment Resort, and its accompanying Mii Amo Spa, both tucked snugly into Boynton Canyon. This place is like a pueblo-style college campus, with rooms spread across several acres and easy access to swimming pools, hot tubs and restaurants, all of them with spectacular views.

Enchantment doesn't come cheaply. Rooms start at $295 a night and go as high as $1,500 for a two-bedroom luxury suite. And other expenditures can add up. A bottle of Absolut vodka from room service is $135.

But it's easy to lose yourself here: There's "Camp Coyote" for kids to attend during the daytime, and at night Enchantment provides baby sitters.

We spent a lot of time at the preternaturally beautiful spa. There's a room called the Crystal Grotto to sit in and meditate. There are slips of paper and pencils outside the grotto. You write your worries on a piece of the paper and drop it into a basket. Later these are burned, releasing your cares. It's worth a try, right? So I scribbled something about my credit card not being declined and tossed it in.

Smoothies, massages, facials ...

At the spa's restaurant and juice bar, everything on the menu has the letters V, P or K after it — for "Vata pacifying food," "Pitta pacifying food" or "Kapha pacifying food." I still have no idea what those things are. But the fruit smoothie I drank, with added echinacea and ginkgo biloba, did ward off my oncoming cold, one that had already flattened my children.

There are more types of cutting-edge massages, facials and yoga programs available here than you thought existed. And it you want a past-life regression session ($220), a psychic massage ($130 an hour), a "palm reading for empowerment" ($130 an hour) or a tarot card reading ($130), you've come to the right place.

Enchantment is serious about pampering its guests, and I recommend a stay here.

We did leave Sedona feeling cleansed and yearning for a return visit. But anyone whose aura is still out of whack after a week in Sedona can, before leaving, drop into a New Age trinket shop and buy something called "Vortex in a Can."

According to the label, the contents have been "humanely gathered during the full lunar eclipse by nonsmoking vegetarians."

Crack it open and take a deep breath.

FINDING THE ENCHANTMENT

GETTING THERE

You can fly from Atlanta to Phoenix on several major airlines. Current lowest fares are $419 nonstop or $275 with a stop. Sedona is a two-hour drive north from Phoenix; the Grand Canyon is another two-and-a-half hours north from Sedona.

WHERE TO STAY

Sedona is full of well-run idiosyncratic hotels in all price ranges. It's hard (though not impossible) to find a room without a remarkable view. The Enchantment Resort and Mii Amo Spa, 928-282-2900, www.enchantmentresort.com, in Boynton Canyon is, well, enchanting. Many rooms have fireplaces. (One-bedroom suites from $295.)

El Portal Sedona, 928-203-9405, www.innsedona.com, in the historic arts district is another good bet. Rooms start at $250. Each room here has a different rustic-chic decor.

The Saddle Rock Ranch, 928-282-7640, 255 Rockridge Drive, www.saddlerockranch.com, is in a remodeled 1920s-era ranch-style home; Barry Goldwater was a regular visitor. Rooms start at $169.

The Forest Houses Resort, 928-282-2999, www.foresthousesresort.com, is a series of cabins along Oak Creek. You'll feel happily far from civilization; its rooms have no televisions or phones. Cabins start at $90. The Forest Houses Web site warns about the small animals you'll see around and the harmless mice and spiders that occasionally sneak into rooms. "There is no extra charge for these critters," it explains.

At the no-frills Matterhorn Inn, 928-282-7176, on the Web at www.matterhornlodge.com, 230 Apple Ave., in Sedona's uptown shopping district, rooms are about $139.

WHERE TO EAT

The homey Coffee Pot Restaurant, 2050 West Highway 89A, 928-282-6626, is the "Home of the Famous 101 Omelets" and a local favorite.

The local hippie intelligentsia hangs out at Raven Heart Coffee, 928-282-5777, www.ravenheartcoffee.net. There are two locations in Sedona; both have strong brew and Wi-Fi.

At Cowboy Club Grille & Spirits, 241 North Highway 89A, 928-282-4200, www.cowboyclub.com, there's cowboy gear on the walls and roomy booths, not to mention good margaritas, rattlesnake skewers and buffalo burgers.

Children will like the Red Planet Diner, 1655 West Highway 89A, 928-282-6070, where flying saucer kitsch decorates the walls.

It's hard to find authentic Southwestern food in Sedona.

There are plenty of good Continental or American-style restaurants: Try the Yavapai Restaurant at the Enchantment Resort, 928-282-2900, and Rene at Tlaquepaque, 363 Highway 179, 928-282-9225, www.rene-sedona.com, which serves French food.

In our quest for good Southwestern or Tex-Mex, we settled for Javelina Cantina, 671 Highway 179, 928-203-9514. The margaritas, burritos and fish tacos are quite good.