May 24
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The restaurant/bar at the Little A'L'Inn got a little interesting last night.The big draw is Area 51, a military/government extremely highly secret facility on millions of acres in the middle of nowhere in Nevada.
Tourists flock in from all over the world to see IT, when in reality you cannot see anything but a fence and the main gate. The actual activities and buildings are so far in that no one can see them. Employees are shuttled daily from Las Vegas on a private airline. All types of conspiracy theorists believe that the government is holding everything from aliens to leap frogs in secret in Area 51. So, they make the long trek into the desert to see nothing...except the A'L'Inn. An old run down building full of alien t-shirts, jewelry and other such stuff. Oh yea, and the Ritz style housing.
All afternoon people from around the world came in rather steadily. At the bar/restaurant last night were
View Larger Map
The restaurant/bar at the Little A'L'Inn got a little interesting last night.The big draw is Area 51, a military/government extremely highly secret facility on millions of acres in the middle of nowhere in Nevada.
Tourists flock in from all over the world to see IT, when in reality you cannot see anything but a fence and the main gate. The actual activities and buildings are so far in that no one can see them. Employees are shuttled daily from Las Vegas on a private airline. All types of conspiracy theorists believe that the government is holding everything from aliens to leap frogs in secret in Area 51. So, they make the long trek into the desert to see nothing...except the A'L'Inn. An old run down building full of alien t-shirts, jewelry and other such stuff. Oh yea, and the Ritz style housing.
All afternoon people from around the world came in rather steadily. At the bar/restaurant last night were
- 3 Aussie attorneys (more on them later)
- a Miss Frump and true conspiracy believer
- two cowboys straight out of central casting. Cowboy hat, wind and sun wrinkled face, long sleeved shirt with shiny buttons, normal leather belt, weathered blue jeans, and cowboy boots. When they removed their hats, only to scratch their heads, it was as white as a baby's butt compared to the dark weathered face.
- 6 Japanese tourists, buying t-shirts and trinkets as fast as they could. Their Japanese guide ordered hamburgers for all of them.
Talk was about everything from aliens to beer and even some politics. We even discussed "coon cheese" a Australian product.
I settled into talking to the 3 Aussie attorneys. Six of them had flown from Melbourne to Las Vegas for a bachelor party, all were in their 30's and 3 were single. Three of them spent three days and turned around and flew home. If you know Aussies, they are big partiers and coming to Vegas had to top anything before, so they worked real hard at it. Evidence on their faces 3 days later indicated they had been successful. .......until facebook. They, like all good healthy 30 year old Aussies, not only had a lot of whiskey in their rooms, but a lot of women in various stages of undress. One of these rocket scientists of lawyers thought that it would be cool to post these pictures on Facebook. There was to be a wedding in 2 weeks and now there seems to be some question if that is going to happen. The two married lawyers spent at least an hour that night on the phone with their respective spouses. Seems a couple of them may need lawyers of their own when they get home. Don't you just love social networking
Despite the luxury accommodation, the people at the Inn were very friendly. They topped Big Red with fuel, less than a gallon, out of a gas can just to be sure I would make it to my next fuel stop. The Aussies had to make a 100 mile round trip back down to Alamo to get fuel to get them to their next destination.
I have seen deer, coyotes, rabbits, rodents and lots of other wildlife.
This guy crossed in front of me and then just stood and watched me.
He too had just crossed the road
In Caliente I stopped for gas and air.
How many mechanics does it take to add air to a vespa
Crossed into Utah and the first thing I noticed is that the Utah cows are not as smart as Nevada cows. Utah just paints lines for cattle guards to keep the cows in.
Nevada cattle guard
Utah guard
The interesting things you find out when you stop to smell the roses. First they took their guns and promised they would not harm them.
I still have not hit the right button on the video, so here is your slide show of Nevada and Utah.
I rolled into my friend John's compound, formerly of Ecuador, deep behind the Zion curtain in the afternoon and he had cold beer ready for me. After another windy day, I needed it.
