Welcome, Rachel.

No, not my-best-mates-back-at-home birds name, or even any ‘Friends’ connotations with Jennifer Anniston, but a town with population of just under 100 about eighty miles north of Las Vegas, that likes to tout itself as the place to be to see a UFO or two.

We escaped – literally, more on that tomorrow – Las Vegas for the day, and headed for the Extraterrestrial Highway, the road that leads up the east side of Nellis Air Force Base which contains the super-secret Area 51, to a town that is cashing in on supposed alien sightings in the area.

Of course, I saw “town”, but really Rachel is just another bunch of trailers, hanging off the side of a dusty road in the middle of nowhere, Nevada desert. Except they’ve made a bit (but not much) of an effort to do up an extra large trailer and call it ‘The Little A’Le’Inn’ and sell a variety of UFO themed snacks and drinks.

Even before we’d got there, a big picture of an alien donned a billboard saying “Area 51 Alien Beef Jerky here!” – but all it did was remind me was how the logo looked just the one one that the computer manufacturer Alienware use, and how that had been the brand of PC that had got stolen from my car back at the beginning of July.

I’d expected it to be some sort of UFO tourist mecca, and I would run around with video camera in hand talking to bemused tourists, and extra-chatty-staff telling us with delight about all the comings and going of UFO sightings they’d seen – their website does after all say “We strive to make you feel at home while being away from your home. So enjoy the many photographs and items hanging on the walls, or maybe you just want to kick back and talk to someone who knows what is going on in the area.” – sounds fun, right?

Not so.

In a rather unimpressive ‘cafe’, some glum looking tourists munch on some food on the table in the middle, and the two guys serving looked at us as though some more tourists – camera clearly slung over my shoulder – was a more surprising sight than an alien itself, and it was hard to get more than two words out of them.

There was some tat to buy though : Area-51 labeled mugs & mouse mats were for sale, along with dodgy looking DVD compilations such as “The best Alien sightings in the world – Volume 3″, for an over-priced price. I tried talking to the guy serving us, but he seemed a little lost, confused, and not at all talkative, so we scanned the room looking for … aliens?

What I did actually see was something that I hadn’t spotted upon initially walking in … an old dude, long white ponytail hair tapping away at an old computer in the corner. I walked over and tried to catch his eye, but he ignored me – then I realised that he was having an intense conversation on hie bluetooth headset instead, although I did wonder how in the middle of Nevada desert he was getting a signal, strange.

I went back to the counter and asked Mr. Surly – “So who’s the chap in the corner?” I asked politely. “Some dude, using his computer” came the gruff five word reply, and no more.

It became clear, that this was not just ‘some dude’ in the corner, as over the next ten minutes the people working there – including the chef out back – came out and spoke to him and I just about hears snatched pieces of conversation about things he was logging and tracking.

At about that moment, there was then a ‘Boom‘ outside, and a slight shake to the building as a sonic boom reverberated around Rachel, and the long haired pony-tail guy barked excitedly into his headset “Did you hear that? Another one just went over!” and feverishly tapped away at his keyboard.

Paul and I didn’t stay much longer after that. Yes I bought some tacky souvenirs, and snapped some photos … but there was an overall impression that we just weren’t welcome. Strange, for a ‘town’ to promote itself as being Alien-friendly, but then to go all weird on people when they tried to ingratiate themselves when they’ve clearly come out of the way because of that.

“I think they thought we were too liberal” pointed out Paul as we wandered back to the car, as he noted that there had been a whole bunch of NRA style pro-gun stickers at the back of the bar [His favourite : "You want my gun? Sure, you can have the bullets first!"] and that us as two guys, no girls in our party … maybe they though we were gay and this didn’t fit in with their hardcore conservative point of views? “Or with your new short haircut”, I pointed out “They probably thought you were from the military, snooping about!”.

Talking of the military and snooping we decided that we did want to do some of that ourselves … by driving as close to Area 51 as we could manage. The A-Le-Inn actually sold maps for 33 cents (what, three for a dollar?) showing ways to the edge of the base. We took one that took us 12 miles down a very straight, dusty and unusually WIDE road … wide enough for what? … to be transported, we wondered.

Down to a point where there was a barrier – double barriers – in fact with big red flashing lights warning us not to go any further. Photos too, were not to be taken. Lights and CCTV cameras pointed down on us, and in a building about 50 yards away inside the base, we could hear a radio? a TV? and talking … life anyway.

“They’re probably scanning your license plate right now” observed Paul. Unlikely, I thought, considering how practically unreadable it is caked in mud and dust where its only had the occasional rain shower to wash it over the last ten weeks.

We stared into the base … really just a long dusty road heading into the mountains, and then turned around , and I wondered if my Alienware computer that was stolen was maybe hidden in a secret laboratory somewhere underneath Groom Lake. I guess I’ll never know.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 26th, 2009 at 10:02 am and is filed under Underground : USA. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed. Share this post on Facebook