Mount Shavano and the Angel of the Snow
Near Salida, Colorado
West of Salida, one summit stands out from the wall of the Sawatch Range. It is Mount Shavano, a peak rising over fourteen thousand two hundred feet, one of Colorado's celebrated fourteeners. Each spring, as the winter snow begins to melt, a strange and lovely thing appears on the eastern face of the mountain.
Snow lingers in a set of gullies and ravines that together form the shape of a figure with outstretched wings. People call it the Angel of Shavano, and for generations it has served the valley as a kind of natural calendar, its appearance a sign that spring has come and the growing season is near. The mountain is named for a real historical figure, a Ute chief named Shavano, sometimes written Chavaneaux, a Ute leader who once ranged across this part of Colorado.
Several different legends have grown up around the snow angel. In one, a Native princess sacrifices herself to end a drought and is remembered in the snow. In another, the figure honors the friendship between Chief Shavano and a mountain man.
Historians and storytellers disagree about which legend, if any, is the true origin. What is certain is that the angel returns, faithfully, on the high east face, every single spring.
