Day 11, Part 2: Tuesday, May 2nd, 2006
Beatty, Nevada to Escalante, Utah

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Any map of Nevada will claim that a town called "Warm Springs" exists where U.S. 6 meets up with Nevada 375, the Extra-Terrestrial Highway. But don't be fooled. Nobody lives there.

When I arrive at the place, there's nobody there but this cow to greet me.

Why not?

The Extra-Terrestrial Highway rolls through mile after empty mile of open plains with snow-capped mountain backdrops. Only occasionally is the desolation punctuated by the presence of a ranch house or a lonely corral.

Rachel is famous because it is the closest town to the Nellis Air Force Test Range and "Area 51", where the US government supposedly tests alien flight technologies that they've back-engineered from captured UFOs. People come here on a regular basis for UFO conventions and to look for strange lights floating over the mountains you see in the background of this picture. Whenever they arrive, they eat at the "Little A'Le'Inn", where the Neon stops on this day to take a break.

I didn't notice this at the time, but on the side of the restaurant building, there's a really cool graphic of an alien riding around in a UFO and blowing something up. The UFO apparently has a US flag on it. :-)


There's supposedly something in Rachel called the "Black Mailbox" which sits at the turn-off to Area 51. I drive around for awhile, looking for it, but come up empty. I do, however, find a plaque which recounts the history of this place. It was evidently founded as late as 1977 to service the "Timpahute" mining operation in the mountains you can see in this picture. The guy who owned the mine named the town after his daughter.

When I hop back onto the ET Highway, I snap this picture of the Rachel sign, just because I think the graphic inside the name of the town looks cool.


The rest of my way through Nevada is accompanied by a lot more Joshua Trees than I expected.

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