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The most time-honored techno-myth in human existence endures on a lonely stretch of highway in central Nevada. It seems an unlikely place for it to happen, this land of tumbleweeds, bullet-ridden road signs, and cattle that roam freely from asphalt to grassland and back again.
But it is here, insiders say, where the amazing truth behind mankind’s decades-long involvement with aliens from outer space, will finally be revealed. This is the town of Rachel, population 100, a one-horse establishment that can hardly be described as a ghost town because there was never really anyone there in the first place.
In Rachel, however, there is more than meets the eye. This ramshackle collection of trailer parks and feed stands is groundzero for two highly-important and fundamentally-opposed movements: it is the site of Nellis Air Force Base, the top-secret training facility where the nation’s (and the world’s) frightening and sophisticated weapons of warfare and space travel are developed; and it is the home of Area 51, the even-more top-secret establishment where the preserved remains of two space aliens and their aircraft are stored in a mysterious bunker called Hangar 18.
At least, that’s the rumor going around. And the people of Rachel have done nothing to challenge those lurid tales. The remote possibility that there are aliens and alien spacecraft in Area 51 have drawn literally thousands of visitors to this desert town that shouldn’t exist at all, and kept its pulse alive as surely as many believe the government has kept alive the beating hearts of the aliens in the clandestine hangar.
“Everyone in this town has a story,” says Brian Paschal, a self-described alien afficionado who has made repeated visits to Rachel. “And they’re all very suspicious – it’s like the moment you step into town, everyone knows about it. You walk into a restaurant, and everyone stops what they’re doing and turns around to check you out. It’s not hard to feel like an outsider.”
“I think there are people and machines from other planets over there,” says Pat Travis, co-owner of the Little A’Le’Inn. “And I think our government is working in conjunction with them.”
Pat Travis and her husband Joe took over what was then the Rachel Bar and Grill, in 1989. Seizing upon the notoriety of what was hidden on the other side of the forbidding brown mountains, the Travises renamed the establishment the Little A’Le’Inn, transforming the tiny restaurant into a sort of museum and gathering place for the alien movement.
The cramped, kitschy Inn is literally jam-packed with alien memorabilia – stickers, hats, t-shirts, posters, stuffed animals… even replicas of the infamous government warning signs which line the perimeter of Nellis Air Force Base (“No Trespassing – Violators Will Be Shot on Site”). The walls are decorated with framed photos of UFO sightings from all over the world. The piece de resistance of this makeshift museum is a panoramic print of the Air Force Base – including what theorists believe to be the hangar containing the alien ruins – snapped from atop Tikaboo Peak, one of the highest non-government owned mountaintops in central Nevada.
A tiny closet in the corner of the Inn contains possibly the most staggering collection of alien- and conspiracy-related videos on earth (or elsewhere). Everything from the abduction-heavy motion picture Fire In The Sky to alien-related television specials are available, providing ample fuel for the uneasiness of the Inn’s guests.
And if that atmosphere is not enough, the whispering wind whipping through the desert at midnight, and the unearthly sirens and wails which occasionally float over the mountains, combine to create a disturbing extraterrestrial scene.
“We tried to create a certain type of atmosphere and experience for our guests,” says Joe Travis. “The reality is, Rachel can be a really creepy place – you come here, and no matter what you thought before, you start to believe…”
Clever entrepreneurial ideas aside, the reasons behind the Travises’ move to Rachel are almost as mysterious as the town itself.
“We just came along and fell in love with the place,” Joe Travis says. “The peace and quiet, the wide open terrain, the mountains… obviously it’s not for everybody, but it felt right for us. And it really has nothing to do with aliens… although of course the aliens help business, too.”
One can only wonder what living in seclusion and dealing with the Area 51 phenomenon and aliens for a living, can do to a person. The Travises seem to draw pleasure from the guests they’ve received at the Inn, the travelers who stopped in hoping for a piece of the legend and magic of Area 51.
“The people who visit are great,” says Pat Travis. “They’re always eager to hear stories, and some of them even have stories of their own. Some of them claim to be abducted, or claim to work for the government. But mostly our visitors are normal, curious people.”
Some of the visitors, however, are in these parts in a more official capacity. Military personnel are known to stop into the Inn from time to time, enjoying breakfast before returning to base or heading south toward Las Vegas. Occasionally the Travises will engage these personnel in conversation, hoping for a nugget of secret information.
“I have never had anybody who works at Area 51 tell us anything,” says Joe with resignation. “We’ve had some of them get pretty drunk, and they still don’t tell anything.”
It’s not hard to understand where that pall of suspicion and distrust which hangs over Rachel’s shanties like a cloud, comes from. Despite the Travises’ civic enthusiasm, Rachel could make a serious bid at being the strangest town in America.
From any point within the “city limits,” the entire town is visible. Save for a few outlying ranches and cabins, it consists of nothing more than trailers and shoddily-built frame structures lining Highway 375. At the southern edge of town, completely opposite the Little A’Le’Inn, is the Area 51 Research Center. Despite what the owners and ‘experts’ there may tell you, this is nothing more than a tourist trap, a vending outpost that just happens to dispense ‘confidential’ military and extraterrestrial knowledge in generous (and expensive) doses. There’s something less charming, and more serious (perhaps delusional) about the Research Center, and it starts with the junked pile of scrap metal and derelict aircraft parts scattered beside the Center’s front door. It carries over into the research trailer, as the denizens dispense “watch the skies” hoopla with a stiff upper lip that makes the whole scene ridiculous.
An occasional vehicle, usually a pickup truck complete with gun rack and dog in tow, will blow through the town, shaking up the dust that invariably settles on the road. The only other visitors, aside from the ranchers and tourists, are the occasional ominous dense desert fog, and perhaps aliens from outer space.
The setting begs the inevitable question: what do the people of Rachel think? It’s impossible to speak for the town as a whole, but the overwhelming impression is this: they do believe. And they have every right to believe: these residents have seen more than their fair share of bizarre occurrences.
Eerie lights and deafening roars are known to sweep through the desert in the dead of night. One resident told of a strange beam of light piercing an iron door at a local café, illuminating the doorjamb. And then there was the heavily-publicized case of the two Las Vegas women who drove up to Rachel to investigate the UFO rumors. Their car became lost in the dusty, mirage-like maze of dirt roads that snake through the mountain ranges, and they came up missing. Their car was found days later, burned-out and abandoned. The women were never seen again.
For years the government swore that Area 51 didn’t exist. Military brass did their damnedest to prevent stories of the top-secret compound from leaking out into the open. Gradually, however, the cover was blown. A disgruntled Nellis employee here, a wayward tourist there, and the advent of the Internet all helped spell doom for the base’s strict secrecy.
The result was an unparalleled media frenzy which put the peculiar little burg of Rachel on the map forever. In conjunction with the 50th anniversary of the alleged crash of an alien craft outside Roswell, New Mexico (the remains of that crash, alien theorists say, are still kept in the hermetically-sealed bunker at Nellis), Rachel played host to a slew of UFO-related festivals and conferences. Television came scrambling to capitalize on the phenomenon: Montell Williams, Larry King Live, and even a PBS ‘Sightings’ special were filmed in and around Rachel. Things would never be the same, for alien-seekers and military officials alike.
The Travises, and their charming Inn, represent just one facet of this tiny, remarkable hamlet. On the outskirts of town, just off the Extraterrestrial Highway, is an Area 51 landmark, known to conspiracy buffs the world over.
It is the Black Mailbox, and its significance lies as the turnoff point for Area 51-bound adventurers. The mailbox is the propertly of Steve Medlin, a longtime rancher whose property butts up against the edges of Nellis Air Force Base. The same dirt road which takes you to the base boundary, comes to a fork several miles off Highway 375. Take the left, and you’re headed for Nellis. Turn right, and you’ll find yourself dodging bullets in no time.
Medlin, who is rumored to have refused a hefty government payoff to relinquish his ranch (prompting conspiracy theorists to believe he may be involved in the government ploy), apparently grew so disgusted with tourists getting lost and ending up on his property, that he has resorted to taking pot shots at any unfamiliar cars headed down his driveway. Take a close look on the gravel road en route to the Medlin property, and you’ll find evidence of his disgust with surprise visitors: rifle shells scattered in every direction.
An unofficial guidebook to the Area 51/Rachel region (written by longtime skywatcher Glenn Campbell, whose falling-out with the Travises and whose longtime alien skepticism has made a hated figure in alien-conspiracy circles) describes the final few steps to the Nellis gate.
“The boundaries of the base are marked by bright orange posts,” the guidebook details. “Do not pass them.”
These boundaries are clearly discernible, thanks to both the orange posts and the weathervane-esque radar towers which stick up out of the dusty ground at various intervals.
The guidebook also describes the men who greet any unwanted visitors to the gate. These men, the official sentinels of Area 51, are called ‘Cammo dudes,’ and the instant an arriving vehicle rounds the final turn before the sign, these Cammo dudes appear. They are known to observe the visitor carefully from afar, using both sophisticated surveillance equipment and standard government-issue Chevrolet Suburbans (always white with dark tinted windows). If you cross the clearly-marked line (distinguished by the infamous signs advocating gunplay in the event of noncompliance), you will be subject to one of the following treatments: a) you will be arrested; b) you will be shot; and c) you will simply vanish from the face of the earth, and become another footnote in the longstanding conspiracy.
And the guidebook doesn’t fail to mention perhaps the best vantage point of them all, the inside view of the base from the summit of Tikaboo Peak. However, the book strongly cautions against this hike, especially in inclement weather conditions:
“The mountain trails to be hiked in order to gain a view of Nellis Air Force Base, can be quite treacherous and dangerous. Do not attempt this hike if you are not in prime physical condition, or if the weather is in any way suspect. Also do not stray from the well-cut trails, or you will die.”
These are the characters and images that make up Rachel and the Area 51 experience. All too often, an inquisitive visitor finds himself driving back toward the decidedly-human lights of Las Vegas, pondering exactly what lies on the other side of the forbidding, forbidden mountain range. In the end, all you’re left with are glimpses of an eerie sign and a white Suburban, unexplained flashes of light in the sky, alien lore… and souvenirs.
“I really believe in UFOs,” says Pat Travis. “This is not just something to sell t-shirts.”
Copyright © 2001 Phil Guidry
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